Worth browning the butter for
Brown butter pecan
Butter cooked until the milk solids turn nut-brown tastes of toffee and toasted hazelnuts before a single nut goes in. Add candied pecans and you have the most grown-up flavour on the site.
- Makes about 1 litre
- 35 min hands-on
- Chill 4 hrs
- Churn 20–30 min
- Ice cream maker needed
Ingredients
- 100 g7 tbsp unsalted butter
- 150 g1½ cups pecan halves
- 400 ml1⅔ cups whole milk
- 400 ml1⅔ cups double cream (heavy cream)
- 130 g⅔ cup light brown sugar
- 4 large egg yolks
- ½ tsp flaky sea salt, plus a pinch for the nuts
Method
Brown butter goes from perfect to burnt in about twenty seconds. Stay at the pan.
- Melt the butter in a light-coloured pan over a medium heat. It will foam, then quieten; when the solids at the bottom turn the colour of a hazelnut and it smells biscuity, take it straight off the heat. Pour it into a bowl, brown bits and all: those brown bits are the flavour.
- Toss the pecans with 1 tbsp of the brown butter and a pinch of salt. Toast at 175°C (350°F) for 8–10 minutes, until fragrant. Cool, then chop roughly.
- Warm the milk, cream, the rest of the brown butter, half the sugar and the salt until steaming.
- Whisk the yolks with the remaining sugar, temper in a ladleful of the hot dairy, and return everything to the pan.
- Cook to 77–82°C (170–180°F), stirring constantly, until it coats the spatula. Strain and chill for at least 4 hours.
- The butter will rise to the top as it chills. Blitz the cold base with a stick blender for ten seconds to bring it back together before churning.
- Churn for 20–30 minutes, folding in the pecans in the last minute. Freeze for 4 hours.
Worth knowing
- Never skip the blitz at step 6. Un-emulsified butter churns into greasy little flecks.
- Toast the nuts, always. Raw pecans go soft and taste of nothing once frozen.
- Light brown sugar rather than white: the molasses in it echoes the browned butter.
- Salted butter works, in which case leave the extra salt out of the base.
Make it yours
Five ways to change it
Maple pecan
Swap 50 g of the sugar for 60 ml maple syrup, added with the cream.
Bourbon butter pecan
Stir 2 tbsp bourbon into the chilled base. It also keeps the scoop softer.
Praline
Coat the toasted pecans in caramel, let them set hard, then smash and fold in.
Brown butter and sage
Crisp eight sage leaves in the butter as it browns, then strain them out. Strange and excellent.
Black walnut
Swap the pecans for walnuts and add an extra pinch of salt.
If it goes wrong
Rescue remedies
There are greasy specks through it
The butter separated. Blitz the chilled base before churning, and make sure it is properly cold when it goes into the machine.
My butter burnt
Once it smells acrid there is no saving it. Start again over a lower heat, and pour it out of the pan the moment it smells of biscuits.
The nuts went soft
They were added too early or not toasted enough. Fold them in during the final minute of churning.
Can I use another nut?
Walnuts, hazelnuts and almonds all work. Hazelnuts are the best match for brown butter.