Adding Nuts to Ice Cream

Nuts add a wonderful crunch and taste to many ice cream recipes. However, raw nuts can get soft and soggy when immersed in liquid or frozen ingredients for a long time. Nuts in ice cream taste best when they are chopped, buttered, salted, and roasted ahead of time. You can buy some nuts, like peanuts, cashews, and pistachios already roasted and salted and all you have to do is chop them up and add them to the ice cream after it is frozen. Other nuts, like walnuts and almonds, are usually raw.

Properly roasted nuts will stay crunchy and delicious for months in frozen ice cream. It is easy to do. Here are the steps.

Use good quality nuts
Weigh the nuts
Chop the nuts coarsely on a cutting board using a large butcher knife. Put the nuts on a silicone mat on a cookie sheet.
Measure the butter, put it in a microwave safe dish, melt it, then pour if over the nuts
Sprinkle on the correct amount of salt, then mix the nuts, butter and salt together
Roast the nuts in the oven at 300 F for the time listed on the recipe until they are golden brown.
Set nuts aside to cool. Add to the ice cream after it is finished freezing.