Deep-Fried Bacon-Wrapped Fried Ice Cream
Deep-Fried Bacon-Wrapped Fried Ice Cream
Go to Google and search bacon. About 178,000,000 results, right? Now search sex. About 3,050,000,000 results (at least by last night's count). So there are some 17 times more results for sex than bacon. That's still a pretty good ratio considering the motivating factor of the human race. So it's no surprise bacon recipes do well, and no surprise bacon-wrapped recipes do well. That's one reason The Daily Meal's Cook editors assigned a week of Recipe SWAT Team to bacon-wrapped recipes (if only there could be a bacon-wrapped sex recipe, but this is a PG-rated site... shh!). When thinking about all the ridiculous, yet tasty and fun bacon-wrapped recipes we could create, one challenge came to mind amongst The Daily Meal's staff: Deep-Fried Bacon-Wrapped Fried Ice Cream. Just saying.
There are all kinds of ridiculous reasons to do try this recipe, but mostly you should try it: 1) because if you don't have one it's a great excuse to go buy a reasonably priced countertop deep-fryer, 2) you're wrapping something with bacon that shouldn't be wrapped with bacon and then fried, and 3) see one and two, but with the dessert factor thrown into the mix. Fair warning... for this recipe you need: (per that first reason) a deep-fryer, patience, and a healthy degree of self-restraint — cereal-crusted ice cream tastes really good even before it's deep-fried.
Two more things to think about before you get started. Many recipes cite a Mexican fried ice cream said to have originated at Chi Chi's. That recipe and many others call for vanilla ice cream and Kellogg's Corn Flakes. Truth is, there are worlds of other possibilities. Think of every ice cream flavor and cereal combination you can. We're talking strawberry ice cream and Fruit Loops and chocolate ice cream and Kellogg's Corn Pops. Everything goes. Many recipes also call for coconut flakes and or nuts. This one doesn't. It's a four-ingredient deep-fried bacon-wrapped fried ice cream. That's it... just four.
Click here to see Dress Your Food in Bacon and Bacon Fat.
Servings
4
Ingredients
- vegetable oil, for frying
- 1 pint vanilla ice cream (or your favorite flavor)
- 12 slices bacon (hickory, apple-smoked, or whatever your favorite kind is as long as it's not tofu or turkey)
- 2 whole eggs
- 2 cup cereal, such as corn flakes
Directions
- Get the fryer going — 370 degrees sounds good.
- Meanwhile, portion out the ice cream. Whichever brand of ice cream you use (I use Häagen-Dazs for this kind of thing if I'm not making my own), and whatever flavor you use (very important here, butter pecan and rum raisin were staff favorite suggestions, bacon ice cream would be epic, of course, but would require another recipe — we went vanilla), you're going to want it to soften enough to be able to cut through it but keep it hard enough so that after cutting into your desired portions, you can quickly refreeze it... hard.
- Portions depend on the brand and its container or the amount of time you're willing to spend forming it to the optimum desired-sized molds for wrapping bacon around them. (Also, be sure to consider the length of the bacon post par-fry!) And the length of time will you'll need to freeze them will vary depending on portion size. The pint of Häagen-Dazs was easily divided into 4 portions after letting it melt enough to slide out of the container. Get those ice cream portions in the freezer immediately on a plate or in a bowl, but separated from each other! In this case, 30 minutes after portioning the ice cream, it should be ready for the next step.
- After portioning the ice cream, par-fry the bacon. With the fryer set to 370 degrees, about 18-23 seconds will do just fine. You want the bacon pliable enough to be able to stretch it out flat after removing it from the fryer without it breaking later when you wrap it around the ice cream, but still done enough that you're only to have to fry the bacon-wrapped ice cream for about 10 seconds or less.
- After removing the bacon slices from the fryer, gently stretch them out on a plate covered with paper towel, cover them with another piece of paper towel, and (making sure the bacon slices are stretched out as you lower them) place a second plate on top. You can turn off your fryer for a while now unless you have a chimichanga to make in the interim. Err on the side of undercooking the bacon. After it has a chance to settle after stretching, you can always fry for another few seconds for more crispness and repeat the stretching and flattening process.
- Whisk the eggs in a bowl to create the egg wash, and using a food processor (or a sealable plastic bag and a rolling pin) crush enough Corn Flakes or other cereal to score 3 cups of powdery-crunchy coating mixture. Remove the ice cream from the freezer when hard, dip in the cereal mixture, and toss additional flaky-powder mixture over until well coated on all sides of each piece.
- Place a piece of waxed or parchment paper on a plate. Remove to the plate and place back in the freezer. Wait another 30 minutes until solid and then dip each piece in the egg wash. Return each, one at a time, to the bowl of cereal powder, making sure to coat on all sides. Place back on the paper-lined plate and freeze for another 30-60 minutes until completely solid. To be safe, leave them in the freezer on high for about 2 hours without opening the door.
- Now the moment of truth.
- Once the ice cream is frozen solid, you need to wrap it with bacon. If the bacon reaches all the way around, if you want to lattice it, if you want to interlace it, tie it in bows and do a head-to-tail wrap so as not to show any of the cereal-crusted ice cream portions beneath it, go for it. This recipe calls for wrapping each cereal-crusted and battered ice cream fillet with 3 rounds of bacon. Where the ends need to meet, use a toothpick to connect them. Once you've wrapped the fillets with par-fried bacon and secured them, stick them back in the freezer for 10 more minutes to be safe. In the meanwhile, power the fryer back up to 370 degrees.
- Here's the tricky part: time to fry. Drop the bacon-wrapped ice cream into the basket gently. Let it settle for about 10 seconds and then remove to a paper towel. Place on a plate and garnish as you desire, but whatever you do, serve and eat it quickly!