My first post-Italy recipe had to be gelato. Specifically, Chocolate Hazelnut Gelato, which has turned out to be my teenager’s favorite. I’ve made it five times since we got home two weeks ago.
When I was in Italy, my goal was to eat gelato every day, preferably a different flavor each time. Allllll the gelato. Sadly, due to the many ups and downs of our journey, I didn’t meet that goal, but toward the end of the trip I started to make up for missed days by having it twice a day. We even had gelato for dinner one night – two cones each – when we returned late from a boat trip and, finding all the restaurants closed, turned instead to the gelato shop around the corner from our apartment in Monterosso.
Not surprisingly, the gelato in Italy was transcendent. Creamy, luscious, not too sweet, and full of flavor. Whereas American ice cream sometimes leans toward packing in lots of chips and chunks, Italian gelato is refreshingly simple (the photo above, drizzled with chocolate and nuts, notwithstanding – I didn’t find this practice to be the norm). We tended to see the same flavors everywhere: vanilla, chocolate, stracciatella (chocolate chip), pistachio, coffee, nocciola (hazelnut) strawberry, lemon, pink grapefruit, and maybe a few others, like melon, ricotta & fig, or lavender-honey. My hands-down favorite was a surprise: pistachio, with its salty-nutty richness, while David was drawn to straight hazelnut. But the one we could both agree on was this chocolate-hazelnut delight, often designated by its famous brand name, Nutella.
I’ve made plenty of ice cream, but I wasn’t quite sure how gelato differed. Gelato, or congelato, means “frozen” in Italian, and in Italy the dessert is often helpfully translated as “ice cream” for English-speakers, which confuses the issue further.
How Gelato Differs from Ice Cream
- Less fat! Gelato, despite its luxuriously creamy texture, actually contains less cream and more milk than ice cream (a ratio of 1:2 as opposed to ice cream’s typical 2:1). Cream’s high fat content coats your palate, making it more difficult to taste flavor nuances; less cream helps flavors shine through.
- Additional silkiness is often provided by either egg yolks or cornstarch, which serves as a stabilizer and is apparently common practice in Southern Italy (I haven’t tried cornstarch yet, but I am intrigued by the prospect of cutting of even more fat from the recipe and will be checking it out for sure).
- There’s a mechanical difference: gelato is churned at a slower rate, which means less air is whipped into it, keeping it soft, dense, and creamy. The slow churn can’t really be replicated with most home ice cream makers, which only have one speed, but I tried to account for this by churning for slightly less time and popping it straight in the freezer to continue solidifying. Which – yay – worked beautifully.
- Gelato is served at a slightly higher temperature than ice cream, so it’s 1) softer, creamier, and 2) your tongue is less likely to numb and hence you’re better able to taste the gelato’s flavor.
One key to this recipe is whipping the heck out of your egg yolks and sugar, until the mixture is thick and pale, almost the consistency of cake batter. This makes for the silkiest, smoothest custard possible, which will translate to creamy frozen wonderfulness.
Once your custard base is ready, add a generous dollop of chocolate-hazelnut paste (I use Nutella) or other flavoring, depending on what you want to make. Recently, to satisfy my pistachio gelato craving, I made a batch with some very spendy pistachio paste, which while insanely delicious was the most ridiculously expensive gelato recipe ever and why you are getting this equally delicious recipe instead. Anyone got a source for cheap bulk Sicilian pistachio paste? Hook a girl up.
Anyway. Add the Nutella to the custard while it’s still warm, which will dissolve it nicely, and then pour the mixture through a fine mesh strainer to filter out any solid bits. 
Be sure to chill the mixture thoroughly in the fridge before churning – I almost always chill overnight – and freeze the bowl of the ice cream maker for at least 24 hours. If there’s even a hint of warmth in the custard mixture or the bowl of your mixer, the gelato won’t freeze properly.
Speaking of ice cream makers: yes, it’s another kitchen appliance to wrangle, but if you are an ice cream/gelato fan, it’s soooooo worth it. A good one can be picked up for less than you might think (this is the one I use).
After about 15 minutes of churning, the gelato will be the consistency of soft-serve ice cream, and though I know it’s tempting to spoon up a big mouthful right away, I strongly encourage you to put down the spoon and freeze it for at least an hour more. It gets gorgeously dense and creamy and trust me, even better. I freeze batches in plastic quart containers that I get on Amazon, which hold almost exactly the entire recipe (there’s maybe about half a cup extra, which I often keep out as the cook’s treat).
I mean, come on. You can’t get that from the grocery store.
BRB, going to make batch number six.
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Chocolate Hazelnut Gelato
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 15 mins
- Total Time: 15 mins plus freezing time
- Yield: 6 generous servings 1x
Description
Transport yourself instantly to a corner shop on a Florentine piazza with this dense, creamy, silky, cool Chocolate Hazelnut Gelato.
Ingredients
1 cup heavy cream
2 cups whole milk
1/2 cup plus 1/4 cup granulated sugar
4 large egg yolks
1/2 cup chocolate hazelnut spread, such as Nutella
Instructions
In a medium saucepan, combine milk, cream, and 1/2 cup sugar. Cook on medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until sugar is dissolved.
In a medium bowl, combine egg yolks and 1/4 cup sugar. Using a hand-held mixer or stand mixer, blend yolks and sugar until thick, pale, and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
Temper the egg yolks: take about half a cup of the hot milk/cream and drizzle it, whisking constantly, into the egg/sugar mixture (this helps to bring the temperatures of the two mixtures closer together so the eggs won’t scramble when added to the milk). Once incorporated, slowly whisk the eggs and milk into the saucepan. Continue to cook for about 5 more minutes, until the mixture thickens slightly.
Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the Nutella, making sure it dissolves completely. Place a fine mesh strainer over a bowl and pour the mixture over to catch any solid bits. Refrigerate the gelato base until thoroughly chilled, preferably overnight.
Once chilled, give the mixture a final stir and pour it into an ice cream maker. Churn for slightly less time than recommended for ice cream (mine recommends 20 minutes of churning for ice cream and I churned it for 15 minutes). Immediately transfer to a freezer-safe container and continue to freeze for at least one additional hour.
Before serving, remove from freezer to let soften slightly. Serve in generous scoops topped, perhaps, with salted chopped hazelnuts, chocolate sauce, cookies, or whatever else sounds delightful.
Notes
… Gelato is not a same-day dish – you’ve got to plan ahead. Be sure to freeze the bowl of your ice cream maker for at least 24 hours, and allow yourself plenty of time to chill the base.
… If you happen to walk away while cooking your custard and it overheats, you may end up with a little scrambled egg in your mixture. Don’t despair! You can strain the little bits out before chilling and the consistency should still be fine. Unless you’ve scrambled alllll the egg, in which case, yeah – start over.
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