#vegan

Ingredients (rough)

• 100g frozen banana chunks, about 1 banana
• 40g soy milk (emulsifier)
• 24g peanut butter (fat)
• 5g cacao nibs (optional)
• 9g square piece lindt sea salt
• 0.3g (sprinkle) of koshering salt
• 3g maple syrup

Blend all together in a powerful blender. Grate some chocolate on top.

Past iterations

Trial one

• 100g semifrozen banana
• 20g soy milk
• 20g peanut butter

Ehh, the semifrozen was pretty sweet and not a vibe. Let's try properly frozen.

Trial two

• 100g frozen banana chunks
• 25g soy milk
• 30g peanut butter
• 1 square piece lindt sea salt
  Delicious, albeit still a bit sweet and banana-ey for a base! Just the right texture. I wonder if a little more soy milk would increase the emulsification and make it thicker, whilst also diluting the banana flavour.

Trial three

• 95g frozen banana chunks
• 40g soy milk
• 20g peanut butter
• 5g cacao nibs
• 1 square piece lindt mint
  Definitely better (ie less sweet) than two. Lets see if we can push the banana:soy ratio to 1:1.5 . Maybe I can even try finding another emulsifier, like the agar agar.

I think the pinch of salt (from an unrecorded trial I had a record success with) is essential. I just read on Wikipedia that

Lactose, which is sugar present in milk, will cause freezing point depression. Thus, on freezing some water will remain unfrozen and will not give a hard texture.

Also, adding salt to water causes freezing point depression, and is responsible for both removing the sharp crunchy icy texture of water in ice cream (by lowering its freezing point), and making wintery snow roads/pavements harder to freeze over, and keeping the ocean liquid in arctic regions.

Also also, salt balances tastes, so it would reduce the excessive sweetness.

I also think that having multiple emulsifiers is required to emulate the presence of casein and whey protein in regular ice cream.

So next time, try adding a pinch of salt and a second emulsifier, like agar agar.

Trial four

• 105g frozen banana chunks, about 1 banana
• 40g soy milk
• 24g peanut butter
• 5g cacao nibs
• 9g square piece lindt sea salt
• 0.1g (sprinkle) of koshering salt
• 1g maple syrup

The salt absolutely did it texture wise! The multiple emulsifiers might not be necessary at all, though I do want to try it (especially since I have agar agar). Best one yet. I reckon we could get away with more salt next time - it wasn't overly salty at all.

Trial five: I used 0.3g of salt, and it seemed to diminish the sweetness by balancing the flavours. To compensate, I used 3g maple syrup. I'm seeing if freezing the ice-cream after making it with extra salt will yield a better texture.