Karak Chai Ice Cream with Date Sauce: A Unique Middle Eastern Dessert Recipe
Discover how to make creamy Karak Chai Ice Cream with rich date sauce—a fusion of Middle Eastern flavours perfect for dessert lovers. Easy recipe with step-by-step instructions!
Ingredients
Ingredients for the Ice Cream
- 500 ml whole milk
- 4 tea bags
- 3 cardamon pods
- 300 ml double cream
Ingredients for the Date Sauce
- 6 medjool dates you can use other types of dates, use around 90 grams, without the seeds
- 60 grams unsalted butter
- 60 grams soft light brown sugar
- 60 grams caster sugar
- 4 tbsp golden syrup
- 200 ml double cream
Instructions
Method for ice cream
- Line a loaf cake tin clingfilm, or a plastic container.
- In a medium size saucepan, add the milk, tea bags, cardamon pods, saffron and condensed milk.
- Bring to the boil then turn the heat down to the lowest heat.You may even want to move the pan to smaller hob to avoid the mixture overspilling the pan.Cook for 7 minutes until you have a golden brown colour.
- Leave the tea mixture to cool down completely (for at least 15-20 minutes). Remove the cardamon pods and the saffron strands. If the tea bags have burst whilst simmering, use a sieve to remove any remains in the mixture.
- Whisk the double cream until you have firm peaks.
- Once the tea mixture has cooled down, fold in the whisked double cream until fully combined. You may need to use a potato masher to help you as the cream tends to lump together.
- Then pour the mixture into a loaf tin/ plastic container and put in the freezer to freeze overnight.
Method for Date Sauce
- Remove the seeds/ pips from the dates, slice them roughly and put them in a bowl.
- Cover the dates with boiling water and leave to sit.
- Add the unsalted butter to a sauce pan and melt, then add in both sugars and stir through. Keep stirring and let the mixture bubble for 3-4 minutes.
- Whilst the butter mixture is simmering, drain the water from the medjool date bowl. The dates should have softened, add them to a food processor and blitz until you have a paste like substance.
- Add the date paste and golden syrup to the butter sauce pan. Stir through, making sure any lumps of dates dissolve in the pan. Turn the heat to low and let everything simmer until it's bubbling (5 minutes).
- Turn the heat off and then stir in the double cream.
- Pour the sauce into a jug, ready to serve.
Serving the ice cream
- When you are ready to serve the ice cream, take the tin out of the freezer, lift out the ice cream and sit it on a board for two to three minutes before fully removing the cling film. Cut into thick slices.
- If you don’t want to eat all the ice cream in one sitting, wrap the remaining unsliced loaf up in the cling film and put it back in the freezer.
- Drizzle the sauce over the ice cream slice in zig zag lines. Leave the remaining sauce in a jug for anyone who wants more with their ice cream slice.
