You can't throw a stick without hitting a butterbeer ice cream recipe these days. Ever since the tasty-sounding drink showed up in the universally-loved Harry Potter book series, it's become something of an obsession among fans.

Even though there is already a saturation of butterbeer ice cream recipes out there, I had to try to create my own version. The books' description of butterbeer is vague at best, though J.K. Rowling has described it as a less sweet version of butterscotch. So that's where I started, with a creamy butterscotch ice cream.

I didn't want to stop there, though. I'm always reminded of cream soda when reading the parts of the books where butterbeer is mentioned, but I knew that adding the soda directly may add an unpleasant icy texture. Instead, I cooked down a few bottles of cream soda into a thick, sweet syrup, and layered it with the churned ice cream for a swirled effect.

Finally, there's questions as to whether or not butterbeer is actually alcoholic (since it's readily consumed by kids in the books), but the stories make reference to people and house elves being under the influence of the drink, so in my mind, it does have at least a slight alcohol content. For that reason, I chose to add a couple tablespoons of dark rum to the ice cream base. This not only has the effect of keeping the ice cream soft, but also adds just enough of a boozy flavor that enhances the butterscotch and cream soda.

It's quite tasty, if I do say so myself, but if you think that you won't like the flavor of the added alcohol, you can absolutely reduce the amount that I used or leave it out entirely (you could replace it with a little rum-flavored extract instead)

Butterbeer Ice Cream For The Grown-Ups

Author: Erin Browne
Yield: 1 quart 1x

Print Recipe

Ingredients

Scale

1 cup packed brown sugar
2 TBS butter
2 TBS dark rum
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup whole milk
2 cups heavy cream, divided
5 large egg yolks
3 12oz bottles of Cream Soda

Instructions

In a small saucepan over medium heat, stir together brown sugar and butter. Allow the butter to melt and the sugar to dissolve. When mixture is bubbly, whisk in ½ cup of the heavy cream until smooth. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla extract and dark rum.
In a large saucepan over medium high heat, combine the remaining heavy cream with the whole milk and bring to a low simmer, but do not allow the mixture to boil.
In a mixing bowl, beat the egg yolks. Drizzle approximately ½ cup of the heated milk and cream mixture into the egg yolks while whisking constantly, and then pour back into the simmering saucepan.
Reduce heat to low and stir constantly until the mixture is slightly thickened and coats the back of the spoon. This will take 4-6 minutes. Remove from heat.
Pour mixture through a fine mesh strainer into a clean bowl and then stir in the butterscotch mixture. Cover with plastic wrap, allowing the wrap to touch the surface of the mixture, and chill at least 3 hours or overnight.
While the mixture is chilling, bring cream soda to a boil over medium high-heat, and then reduce to a heavy simmer. Allow to simmer until thickened and reduced to ⅓ of the original amount. Remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature or transfer to a container and chill in the refrigerator.
Once ice cream base has thoroughly chilled, churn in ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions. Layer ⅓ of the ice cream mixture in the bottom of a freezer safe container and drizzle on some of the cream soda syrup. Repeat layers until all of the ice cream is used. If desired, reserve some of the syrup to drizzle on when ice cream is served.
Store ice cream in freezer.