RECIPE: S’mores Baked Alaska

August 9, 2015 at 10:26 am · Filed under Desserts, Food Holidays, Ice Cream-Sorbet-Yogurt, Recipes

S’mores Baked Alaska. Chef Brian molds the
ice cream on top of the cake layer before
covering the ice cream with Marshmallow
Fluff. We took an easier path, creating a
layered ice cream cake and covering the
Hotels.

For National S’mores Day on August 10th, here’s a brand new take on the classic, gooey chocolate bar, marshmallow and graham cracker cookie sandwich.

Chef Brian Millman at Atwood Kitchen & Bar Room in New York City has created S’mores Baked Alaska, a twist on the American classic of ice cream cake*, shrouded in freshly-whipped meringue and then browned under a broiler or with a kitchen torch.

WHY YOU CAN BAKE ICE CREAM WITHOUT MELTING IT

The beaten egg whites in the meringue protect the ice cream from melting because beating unfolds the protein molecules. This causes air bubbles to be trapped in the unfolded proteins. This foam acts as an insulating layer around the ice cream and protects it [for a brief time] from the heat.

This dynamic was discovered by a prominent physicist, Benjamin Thompson, at the beginning of the 19th century. Here’s the history of Baked Alaska.

WHY YOU CAN BAKE ICE CREAM WITHOUT MELTING IT

The beaten egg whites in the meringue protect the ice cream from melting because beating unfolds the protein molecules and causes air bubbles to be trapped in the unfolded proteins. This foam acts as an insulating layer around the ice cream and protects it from the heat.

This was discovered by a prominent physicist, Benjamin Thompson, at the beginning of the 19th century. Here’s the history of Baked Alaska.

Meringue has similar ingredients to marshmallow, which is why marshmallow cream also works.

Meringue ingredients: egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar

Marshmallow Fluff ingredients: egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar, water, salt and vanilla extract

READY TO MAKE YOUR OWN BAKED ALASKA?

Chef Brian makes these substitutions to turn S’mores into Baked Alaska:

Chocolate cake and chocolate sauce instead of the S’mores chocolate bar

Marshmallow Fluff instead of the S’mores marshmallows and meringue

Graham cracker marshmallow ice cream and graham cracker crumbs instead of the whole graham crackers (Chef Brian makes his own marshmallow and graham cracker ice cream; but you can make hack a variation from a quart of vanilla, some mini marshmallows and graham cracker crumbs)

He also adds a pinch of flake sea salt (Cyprus Flake Sea Salt and Maldon Flake Salt flake salts are typically available at specialty food stores or fine supermarkets).

You can use your broiler to brûlée the Fluff; but if you have one, use a kitchen torch instead. With a torch:

You can evenly brown the entire surface. Under a broiler, when the top is perfectly browned, the sides will be much lighter.

You don’t have to check the broiler to see how the browning is going. A delicate process, it can turn from done to overdone in seconds. The torch gives you control.

RECIPE: S’MORES BAKED ALASKA

Here’s how we adapted Chef Brian’s concept to make our own version of S’mores Baked Alaska:

You can bake the cake or buy a chocolate loaf cake (or any unfrosted chocolate cake). You can make the marshmallow ice cream from scratch (here’s a recipe—add the graham cracker crumbs), or buy ice cream and mix in the crumbled graham crackers.

Ingredients

1 chocolate cake: loaf, sheet or uniced layers

1 quart vanilla ice cream plus mini marshmallows, store-bought marshmallow ice cream* or homemade marshmallow ice cream

Graham crackers or graham cracker crumbs‡

1 marshmallow fluff tub (16 ounces) Marshmallow Fluff or other marshmallow cream

Garnish: graham cracker crumbs

Add mini marshmallows to softened ice cream to make “quickie” marshmallow ice cream. Photo courtesy DeBakery.Weebly.com.

Optional garnishes: chocolate sauce, coarse sea salt or flake salt (like Maldon—see the different types of salt)

Preparation

1. MAKE “quick” marshmallow-graham cracker ice cream: Soften the quart of vanilla ice cream on the counter. While the ice cream softens, crumble the whole graham crackers between sheets of wax paper, using a rolling pin. When the ice cream is soft enough to stir, use a spatula to scoop it into a mixing bowl; add the crumbs and stir to combine. Then add the marshmallows and stir. Place the ice cream back into the container. The lid will no longer fit, so cover the top with plastic wrap.

2. ASSEMBLE the ice cream cake. Create a middle layer of ice cream. For a loaf cake, cut in half horizontally; for a sheet cake, cut two “layers.” Wrap in plastic and place in the freezer. When ready to serve…

3. PLACE the ice cream cake on a heat-proof (or sturdy) serving plate and use a spatula to cover the sides and top with Marshmallow Fluff. Use the torch to brûlée, on all sides. If the plate isn’t heat-proof, steer clear of the lower part of the cake.

4. BRING to the table. Dip the knife in warm water to cut. Sprinkle the edges of each dessert plate with graham cracker crumbs and place the sliced cake on top. Pass the optional chocolate sauce and sea salt so guests can customize their portions.

*Baked Alaska is typically made with a thin cake layer on the bottom, and two or more different flavors of ice cream on top. When we created our version of S’mores Baked Alaska, it was easier for us to use thicker layers of cake, for a 50:50 proportion of ice cream to cake. You can construct your Baked Alaska in the proportion you wish.

†Chocolate Marshmallow ice cream from Turkey Hill, S’mores from Ben & Jerry’s, Schwan’s Chocolate Ripple and others have a base of chocolate ice cream. We prefer a vanilla base, so we made our own.

‡We crumbled our own when we could have purchased crumbs. The reason: We preferred the texture of the larger home-crumbled pieces of graham crackers in the ice cream. The purchased crumbs, however, are fine.

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