Ibarra Chocolate Ice Cream had been in the back of my mind, on the palate of my imagination, for several days. I needed a break from my mango obsession, and I needed some homemade ice cream. Ibarra, the rich, coarse Mexican chocolate which has served me so well in any recipe calling for chocolate, was once again a winner, making an outstandingly rich chocolate ice cream. This will be my numero uno chocolate ice cream recipe from now on.
Ibarra Chocolate Ice Cream
- 2 cups (480 ml.) raw heavy cream
- 1 cup (240 ml.) raw whole milk
- 8 oz. (225 grams) Ibarra chocolate
- 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
- 2 tablespoon (3 ml.) liqueur or alcohol, such as brandy or vodka
Heat cream and milk over a medium-low heat until it reaches a simmer. Remove from heat.
While milk is heating, soften Ibarra chocolate by placing discs on a plate in a micro-wave oven for 20 seconds, or until soft enough to cut into pieces with a knife.
Put chocolate, salt and 1 1/2 cups of hot milk mixture into a blender. Holding down blender lid very tightly and securely*, blend until chocolate is dissolved, about 20-30 seconds. Pour into a bowl and stir in remainder of hot milk. Refrigerate overnight or until very cold.
Stir in liqueur of your choice and freeze mixture in an ice cream maker, following manufacturer’s instructions. Pack into a container and freeze for at least two hours to ripen — to freeze until firm. If frozen for longer, allow to soften in the refrigerator until soft enough to serve.
The ice cream is done when it forms into a solid mass and is no longer mixed by the turning paddle. This recipe took 25 minutes to freeze in my Cuisinart ice cream machine. After you have made ice cream a few times, your ear will become attuned to the change of the motor sound when the ice cream is too hard to turn the paddle. Using a wooden spoon, remove it from the canister. A metal spoon could scratch the interior. A thin layer of very hard ice cream will remain stuck to the inside. Let it soften at room temperature. Then you get to eat it — the cook’s reward. Immediately wash the interior of the cannister with hot water and soap, dry well and return it to the freezer, ready for your next ice cream attack.
More recipes using Ibarra Chocolate:
Sexy, Chocolate, Chocolate Pumpkin Seed Cookies
Mexican Coconut Macaroons Dipped in Ibarra Chocolate
Chocolate Mousse with Mexican Ibarra Chocolate
Notes:
For the liqueur, I used Grand Marnier, thinking the orange flavor would compliment the chocolate. The Grand Marnier flavor was lost, dominated by the rich Ibarra. Next time, I will use brandy or vodka.
No sugar is used in this recipe because of the high sugar content of Ibarra chocolate.
If you substitute bittersweet chocolate in this recipe, add 1/3 to 1/2 cup (2.25 oz./65 grams to 3.5 oz./80 grams) of sugar, organic of course.
Organic raw milk and cream are always preferable to commercial dairy products. They do not contain growth hormones and antibiotics and have a sweet, fresh flavor.
*Be very careful with hot liquids in a blender. The heat of the liquid can push the lid off the blender, scalding you and making a mess in the kitchen.
Alcohol is added to produce a softer ice cream. It is not necessary, but without it, the ice cream will be firmer.
I use an ice cream maker made by Cuisinart and I highly recommend it.
Cooking in Mexico 
I finally made your ice cream. It is great! Love the Ibarra chocolate. The texture is so smooth. Thanks!
I’m glad that you made it, Michael. Isn’t it good! I was just wondering what to serve for one of my desserts for Christmas dinner. Maybe I’ll have to make Ibarra ice cream.
What a fabulous ice cream. I can’t wait to give it a try. I’m thinking it would be great with Amaretto… oh my!
:)
ButterYum
It is too good. If there is some in the freezer, it is calling my name all day!
Kathleen,
That’s right. I think that we tried our little hand freezer from Ken’s boat in the summer. Later, Jerry and I had fine results when visiting at other times of the year. That recipe had bitter sweet chocolate and eggs and cream. We used the local crema para batar that at the time was difficult to find, but is almost everywhere now. It does pay to check dates. In Mexico it is not unusual to find dairy products on the shelves way after their pull dates.
Take good care and love,
Lorin
Kathleen,
It was and is fantastic. I used Brandy. I ended up having to chill it over night, but my maker also chills. My blade got stuck at first because I turned on the chill switch about five minutes before pouring in the mixture and it froze up. Thanks for a great recipe that doesn’t require a custard base. In the past, our best chocolate ice cream recipe had eggs. Didn’t we make it in San Pancho with the hand freezer?
Lots of love,
Lorin
I’m glad you like it. I think this is the first really smooth ice cream I have made that is not a cooked custard. And it’s so rich tasting, even without eggs. Yes, we made an ice cream in San Pancho, but I don’t think it got hard enough. It was still good — it’s hard to go wrong with chocolate.
Hugs,
K
I’m on my way out to pickup the chocolate and make the mixture. I’ll cool it and may be able to make the ice cream tonight as my maker doesn’t require freezer time. It’s a great old gelato maker that I got used years ago. It hasn’t been out to play for awhile.
Lorin
I’m sure this ice cream will turn out great, but be sure the mixture is very well chilled first. Let me know what you think of it.
I’ve been meaning to make ice cream all summer. I can’t seem to get my freezer emptied out! Looks great–I’ve never had Ibarra chocolate before. It’s fun trying out all of the chocolates around the world though isn’t it?
You mean “can’t seem to get my freezer emptied out” to make room for the ice cream canister? A common complaint. I finally made room in my freezer for the canister. It is washed, dried, and immediately back in its place in the freezer before something else takes its place. If you have a Mexican grocery store in your area, you will find Abuelita or Ibarra chocolate. I prefer Ibarra. Also, large supermarkets now have a Mexican aisle, with chocolate and other goodies.
YES! I love your idea to keep the ice cream canister in its proper place at all times. I WILL try out your ice cream!
I will warn you that this practice takes some self-discipline. It is often tempting to take the cannister out of the freezer and put a frozen chicken or bag of peas in its place if space is tight. But you can always put something inside the cannister. Ours has a bag of popsicles in it right now.
Very funny!
ok, I cleaned my freezer out a month ago. Now I am going to look for Ibarra chocolate. Thanks for the inspiration. My ice cream maker bowl now has a permanent home in the freezer thanks to you.
I haven’t thought about this ice cream in a while, since the summer heat lessened. You have put it back in my head — I’ll have to make it, also!
Priorities. Priorities. Gotta make room for Ice Cream!!!
I have one shelf in the freezer designated for ice cream …. and a bottle of Russian Vodka!
Did you get the ice cream maker you ordered?
Yes! Love it.
I’m enjoying fresh Georgia peaches and blueberrie are abundant this year. After the fresh fruits are gone, I will try Mexican Chocolate but will add a little rum to my mixture.
I just made Ibarra Chocolate Ice Cream again, this time with brandy. It is delicious!
I forgot about the sugar being added – not white processed sugar but the beautiful brown natural sugar. When I first started traveling in Mexico, I picked up a sugar container and thought, “Gee, the dust even gets in the sugar.” Later I learned Mexico has some of the best natural sugar I’ve ever tasted. When I returned to CA, I was loaded with sugar, coffee con azcur, moles, chocolate, and art work! I’d give away clothes to make room in my suitcases for the goodies. The dang airport customs agents kept stealing my avocados! They have NO sense of humor at all.
I rented a house in San Blas for a year and would travel back and forth from CA – weather and scorpions permitting! $600 for the entire year and it was near the beach.
I’d drive through the mountains to Tepic rather than take the highway and there is a little town that smells like roasted coffee in the mountains – the beans are grown there. Is that the area you are referring to?
Also, one could buy roasted bananas in the town.
Yes, please do a posting about the coffee.
It probably is the same area, or thereabouts, Vicki. Compostela is on the way to Tepic. They grow coffee all over around this town, and much of it is for export. We will next go there when we run out of coffee beans, and I hope it is soon. I guess I better start drinking more coffee!
Off topic: Do the gals still own the little espresso shop in San Pancho?
It was the talk of the town for a while. One of the women is Mexican and the other is from the states. They were/are partners and that was so shocking in such a small town. I loved the espressos they served. Also, the girls would serve meals on special occassions that were fabulous. Their place was right in town in a small house.
I heard about these two and heard raves about their food. I don’t think they are still in business, but I’ll ask about it and let you know.
Gloria and Treeny have a bar and restaurant in San Pancho still. It is La Olla Rica. It is still on the same corner, but much larger and fancier. They are only open for the high season. They stopped the coffee and ice cream thing years ago. They also had a great pizza wood oven going for years. Now they cater to the very rich gringos and manage some of their rentals as well.
I forgot to mention the small world thing, Gloria is from Silverton Oregon originally. Her family is still here.
Thrilling news!
When I met the girls about 1998, the pressure from the Mexican community was pretty rough on them, but Gloria had the mind of an entrepreneur starting the coffee bar. I was thrilled to find Mocha Caps and great company when I was staying in San Pancho. I would jog into town and head straight for their corner cafe (and the panaderia). I’ll never forget sharing Valentine’s Day dinner with the Gringos living in the area and the visitors, like me, and the wonderful food the girls served.
Also, there was a Mexican woman and her husband, both teachers and very involved in the education and saving the turtles, who invited me for dinner. I wish I could remember their name, but I’m sure they stayed where their heart is – San Pancho.
I laugh at the lack of transportation in the area. Having a late dinner on Valentines Day, I didn’t want to walk (or run) back to my renta casa – I had to wake up the one and only taxi driver!
Gotta love Mexico.
BTW, the husband was American and from the west coast. He and his son took me to various places along the coast where we could swim, snorkel, and eat the best shrimp cocktails.
Thanks for answering Vicki’s question, Lorin.
What a terrrific idea. I love Mexican chocolate. Imagine drizzling a little dark chocolate sauce over the top and some sliced almonds.
Makes me think of Oaxaca and wandering around a little market in the mountains.
I could smell chocolate and followed my nose – the Indians were grinding chocolate,
spices, and almonds in ancient machines. Indians ladies were kneeled down in front to the machines holding containers to catch the chocolate mixture. Oh, the smell! I brought home a lot of the chocolate and wouldn’t share even a little tiny piece with friends. I was the same about the beautiful moles from Oaxaca! Mine. All mine.
Speaking of hoarding ~ do you buy cafe con azucar? Beans roasted in sugar?
I looked at one of my old travel journals a couple days ago. For the first few days, I lived on cafe con leche from vendors in Guadalajara.
You are so lucky!!
Hola Vicki,
I thought of adding sauce and almonds, also, but the Ibarra chocolate ice cream was so good on its own. Really a rich, rich ice cream.
We visited Puebla years ago, and encountered an elderly woman selling chocolate she had ground with sugar, cinnamon and almonds. It was meant for making hot chocolate, but was so good eaten out of hand. After we tasted it, we had to hunt her down to buy more. Hoarding was not an issue, because it did not last long enough to even make it back home!
We buy green coffee beans from a large coopertivo near Campostela, Nayarit. (I hope to make this the subject of a future post.) We roast our own, but without sugar. I know what you mean about coffee obsession. When we spent time in Vera Cruz, we thought we could drink coffee con leche all day, like the locals. After a few days, when we couldn’t sleep, we knew it was time to cut back. And yes, we know how lucky we are.
Kathy,
That sounds great! I have an abundance of raw cream. Jerry has been trying his hand with cheeses a little, but ice cream this time of year sounds better. Cranefixer from Oregon should know that most large chain grocery stores have the chocolate because of our large Hispanic population. There lots of small Mexican markets as well and the Ibarra chocolate is a staple.
Lorin
I hope Jerry tried this recipe. It is outstanding. I just finished the last of the ice cream today, and I’m ready to make more. But we can’t eat chocolate ice cream everyday, can we?
Chocolate is like deep frying
You could coat a shoe in Chocolate and it would be YUMMY
But Cold chocolate you can swirl on the roof of your mouth is just beyond the boundaries of flavordom.
I need to find this mejicano choco in oregon and make this my wife and kids would build a statue to worship me :)
I have always wanted to find fresh Vanilla beans and make eye scream with it well maybe someday :)
Yup, you hit the nail on the head. Anything involving chocolate, even old shoes, would be a hit. If you are in an area with a hispanic population, the regular supermarkets should carry Ibarra or Abuelita chocolate. Let me know if you find any.
That is too funny! I made the same thing yesterday, only without the booze. I adapted the chocolate recipe in my Cuisinart pamphlet to use Ibarra. It came out great, we tasted it a little but are serving it to guests tonight!
Great minds think alike… :) Did your recipe exactly duplicate mine?
Ours is half gone, and the remainder is in the freezer, calling my name.
I didn’t use raw milk or cream and there was some sugar added, I believe 1/2 cup. I also used a food processor.
But don’t you have a problem with too much liquid running down the center tube of the processor? Mine is an old one; maybe the newer ones don’t have this problem.
The recipe I used called for 1 cup of whole milk, heated until almost boiling. The chocolate , sugar & salt are processed in the processor until finely chopped, then the hot milk is added. That is processed until smooth. After it is cool you stir in the heavy cream that is already chilled, along with a tsp of vanilla. So the food processor only has to deal with 1 cup of milk, so no problems with leaking….
This looks really great!
If you love chocolate ice cream, you will love this recipe. I hope you try it.