cherry ice cream cake(s)

coated in cherry dip with a cherry sauce core

every few months there’s a recipe i get really stuck on, and i have to test it a lot. surprisingly, this was one of those recipes, which felt so silly because, after all, it’s just ice cream cake (literally, it’s ice cream molded into a cake shape with some toppings). but, sometimes, it’s the simplicity that really gets me, when the possibilities of what could be created are endless... 

originally, i had developed an idea for a tiered ice cream cake where each level is filled with a different kind of nut praliné (théo’s dream birthday cake, he’s a summer baby and i was making it for him). while i had tested with pecan praliné and the filling remained liquid for about 24 hours, when i tried the cake with the addition of the hazelnut and peanut pralinés, the fillings froze too-hard far, far faster. i eliminated that idea, as it was too complicated and time-consuming. so then i produced an ice cream cake with pecan praliné only, but i didn’t photograph the finished product well and i wasn’t sure how many people (outside of théo and me) were all that excited about a pecan praliné ice cream cake (it’s okay we’re still enjoying it). so it was back to the drawing board. i didn’t want to give up on the idea of making an ice cream cake because 1. no oven is required and it really is too hot in my apartment to turn on the oven right now, and 2. it can be made far in advance and served whenever. 

i thought about doing a strawberries and cream ice cream cake, but i already did a strawberries and cream recipe last month, so that felt like overkill. then at the market, i saw these gorgeous, luminous sour cherries, and decided it would be fun to re-invent one of my favorite nostalgic ice-cream desserts, cherry dip. if you are not already a fan, cherry dip is a soft serve ice cream in a cone, and then the ice cream is dipped into a bright red ‘cherry’ coating that instantly freezes into a shell on the ice cream (think chocolate magic shell, but cherry flavor). the aesthetics are so on point, and despite my strong dislike for cherry-flavored medicine, i quite enjoy the artificial cherry flavor here. 

to note: if you are anti-artificial flavoring/coloring you can flavor the coating any way you want to. feel free to skip the dye (i think almond or mint extract or vanilla bean paste would also be delicious, or you can leave it plain and sub the white chocolate for dark chocolate)! 

i thought it would be a lot of fun to incorporate those beautiful fresh sour cherries into the desert, by creating a semi-liquid, slightly boozey, cherry filling to go inside the ice cream cake(s). if the cake is served completely frozen, the filling will remain just slightly softer than the ice cream itself. and, if you time the whole thing just right, you might be lucky enough to get a cherry core that spills out onto the plate. *please note that the freezing point of the cherry sauce is approximately 28f so it will take a little bit of time to cool down to that temperature and fully freeze (though the amount of time depends on many things, like how much cherry sauce there is in your cake, your freezer temperature, etc.).

i have given directions for and scaled this recipe in two ways (but if you’re using another shape of pan, just let me know in the comments and i can help you calculate the quantities needed :) ). please note that the cake must be made in a silicone or springform/cheesecake pan, otherwise it is too difficult to remove

the two versions:

• 1 large cake made with a springform pan (either 9”x3” or 8”x3”) the quantities for this and directions are just below

• 8 individual serving molds (see the photo below), the quantities for this and the directions for using individual molds can be found at the bottom of the page