Summer might be officially ‘over’, but eating ice cream will live on throughout the year. My parents would make ice cream every summer, and I have tried to continue on with the tradition in my household. Our ice cream maker of old was a big wooden bucket with a hand crank. We all happily took our turns to help churn out a slightly icey, homemade vanilla ice cream. The ice cream makers, recipes and flavors have come a long way since then. As a recent fan of savory ice creams, I really wanted to experiment with some cheese flavors. Dziugas is an amazing cows milk cheese from Lithuania that we carry at the shop. Aged for 3 years, it has the perfect level of salty-sweetness that results in an ice cream with serious caramel notes. This is a no-churn ice cream, so no fancy ice cream makers required. You can easily whip it up on a rainy morning and have a treat of frozen creamy deliciousness ready for when the sun pops out later in the day.  Long live Summer!  Enjoy!

Ingredients

• 1/3 pound Dziugas*

• 1 1/2 cups heavy cream

• 6 large eggs

• 1 cup sugar

• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

*Items with an asterisk can be found at The Cheese Shop of Salem!

Directions

1. Using the fine hole side of a box grater, grate half the Dziugas into a bowl, and the other half of the using the larger holes. Mix and crumble by hand so that you have different sizes and shapes of cheese bits. You should end up with about 1 3/4 cups. Cover and put in the freezer.

2. In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip heavy cream until stiff peaks form. Transfer whipped cream to a bowl and refrigerate.

3. Prepare a double boiler by adding 3-4 inches of water to a medium sauce pan. Bring to a low boil over medium-high heat. 

4. Wipe out the bowl to the mixer and add the eggs, sugar and salt. Whisk by hand until blended.

5. Place bowl over sauce pan to create a double boiler, reducing heat to low. Cook the egg mixture, lightly whisking continually, until a thermometer reads 160 degrees.

6. Remove bowl from heat and fit it onto the mixer with the whisk attachment. Begin mixing on medium and increase the speed gradually until you reach the highest setting. Continue to whisk on high for about 10 minutes. Mixture should be thick and ribbon-like, will have doubled in size, and will resemble a loose custard.

7. Remove bowl from the mixer and stir in the grated Dziugas from the freezer. Next take the whipped cream from the refrigerator and gently fold into the custard mixture, being sure that it is fully incorporated and mixed well. Transfer mixture to a freezer safe bowl or container. Cover and allow to freeze fully for a minium of 12 hours.  

Serves 6