more ice cream sandwiches! this was inspired by a fun weekend trip from a few weeks ago
i love hiking and have plans to do a grand 8-day hike in new zealand over christmas this year, which requires a certain amount of training and conditioning just to carry the pack weight needed to carry 8 days of food
so in order to train, i go out on day walks with “fake” heavy packs - water,
sandbags, books, etc - but on this fateful weekend my husband and i wanted to make it fun and go out for a lovely coastal day hike for our training
it was forecast to be hot hot hot, so instead of books and sandbags we bought the heaviest foods we could think of - an entire rockmelon, a quarter watermelon, tomatoes, mozzarella, baguettes, and instead of muesli bars, lamingtons
we walked and walked and got very, very hot carrying these heavy packs in the hot sun up and down stairs until we finally got to the lunch spot by a beach
i laid all our lovely lunch supplies out for our picnic lunch, then we ran in for a dip in the cool, refreshing ocean
we got back to find a crow had opened the lamington packet and flung the lamingtons all over the sandy beach
not a single lamington was eaten that day (by us!) but the crow got at least three
anyway, this is the lamington ice cream sandwich i daydreamed of on the walk back that day - it’s a cocoa cookie, filled with vanilla ice cream, raspberry jam centre, and rolled in desiccated coconut
cold, creamy, essence of lamington
no hiking required
makes about 4-6 sandwiches
ingredients
cocoa cookie
57g butter, softened
80g white sugar
0.5 egg
75g plain flour
pinch baking powder
pinch salt
16g cocoa powder
assembly
one pint of the best quality vanilla ice cream you can find
raspberry jam
desiccated coconut
method
matcha cookie
beat together the butter (57g) and sugar (80g) until light and fluffy
stir in the egg (0.5) until combined
add the flour (75g), salt (pinch), baking powder (pinch) and cocoa powder (16g) and stir until well combined and free of streaks
lay a piece of plastic wrap over your work surface
turn out the matcha cookie dough onto the plastic wrap
pat into a flat disc about 4mm thick
wrap in plastic wrap and chill until firm enough to cut
once chilled, preheat the oven to 170C
unwrap the cookie dough and, using a glass or jar as a stencil, cut into circular cookies
note: make sure the stencil and your muffin tin (see assembly below) are about the same diameter
arrange 1 inch apart on a baking tray
bake for 10-15 minutes
let cool completely
assembly
while the cocoa cookies cool, we’re going to pre-shape the ice cream filling
lay a new sheet of plastic wrap over a muffin tin
generously spoon your vanilla ice cream into the lined muffin tins, smoothing the tops to create little hockey pucks of vanilla ice cream (the exact thickness is up to you but i went for about 3cm thick)
cover and return to the freezer to freeze solid
once both cookies and ice cream are totally solid, assemble the ice cream sandwiches
lay the ice cream puck onto one cookie
with a teaspoon, carve out a little pocket in the middle of the ice cream puck and fill with a dollop of raspberry jam
smooth over with the ice cream you carved out to seal the raspberry jam inside
cover with the other cookie
finish the edges by rolling the sandwich in desiccated coconut
repeat with the remaining cookies and ice cream
now for the hard part: wrap each ice cream sandwich in plastic wrap and leave at least overnight
this helps the cookie soften and give it that classic ice cream sandwich texture
make a batch now and enjoy all week long