Serves: Makes 25 squares
I’m hoping that someone, somewhere is enjoying a scorching summer (probably everywhere but the British Isles) and that they may be glad of a frozen pudding to cool themselves down. These lemony ice cream squares are summer on a plate. It’s a really easy pudding, absolutely no cooking involved unless you count melting butter, but it takes a bit of time to complete due to the freezing of the various layers. I think the slighter softer scoop ice creams (like Carte D’Or or Mackies here in Scotland) work best as they never set very hard which can make it difficult to beat the ice cream and cut into squares for serving.
Ingredients
- 300g amaretti biscuits
- 100g pecans
- 130g unsalted butter, melted
- 2 x 320g jars lemon curd
- 900g vanilla ice cream
Method
- Heat the oven, fan 200˚c, mark 6. Line a 9 x 9 square tin with non-stick parchment and set aside. Line a large baking tray with parchment.
- Put the amaretti biscuits and pecans into a food processor and blend to fine crumbs. Add the melted butter and blend for a few seconds. Spoon onto the lined baking tray and bake in the oven for 4-5 minutes until starting to colour at the edges. Stir the crumbs around and bake for a further 3-4 minutes. Leave until cold.
- Pour half the crumbs into the prepared square tin and spread to the edges. Press down to compact the crumbs. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes. Carefully spread one of the jars of lemon curd over the crumbs. I use a dough scraper or large palette knife for this so I don’t pick up too many crumbs. Freeze for 30 minutes. At the same time take the ice cream out of the freezer to soften up.
- Scoop the ice cream into a mixing bowl and beat until smooth –but not too melted. Spoon the ice cream into the tin and spread it over the curd, levelling off the surface. Freeze until hard-at least 4-5 hours.
- When the ice cream is hard spread the second jar of lemon curd over the top and sprinkle with the remaining crumbs, patting down to compact them a little. Freeze for one hour.
- To serve, lift the ice cream out the tin ( I use the parchment to pull it up and out) and cut into squares. Serve immediately.
