Waffles and Bacon Frozen Custard

Subtly sweet, with nutty, toasted hints from browned butter and flax meal, this frozen custard is creamy, a little crunchy, and just unusual enough to peak everyone's curiosity. It's also totally gluten-free, so celiac sufferers rejoice! It's a lot of work, but totally worth the effort once it's in your bowl.

• Preparation Time: 20 mins
• Cooking Time: 1 hr 31 mins
• Total Time: 1 hr 51 mins
• Calories: 343 Calories

Ingredients

• ½ cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup milk
• ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar
• 4 egg yolks
• ¼ cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 tablespoon maple syrup
• 3 slices thick-cut bacon
• 1 ½ teaspoons maple syrup
• ½ teaspoon flax seed meal
• 16 fluid ounces half-and-half

Recipe Instructions

Step 1

Place butter in a pot over medium heat; cook and stir until mostly melted, 1 to 2 minutes. Add flax meal and cinnamon; cook and stir until butter becomes a deep toasty brown, about 3 to 5 minutes. Pour browned butter into a large heat-resistent bowl.

Step 2

Mix half-and-half, milk, white sugar, brown sugar, and vanilla extract together in a pot over medium-high heat. As the mixture approaches a boil, scoop out 1/4 cup and whisk it with egg yolks in a bowl. Repeat this 3 or 4 times until egg mixture is almost doubled in volume. Stir egg mixture into milk mixture; simmer until custard begins to thicken, about 2 minutes.

Step 3

Pour custard through a strainer into the bowl with browned butter; stir until butter is incorporated. Cover bowl and refrigerate until completely cooled, 6 hours to overnight.

Step 4

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and place a wire rack on top.

Step 5

Mix brown sugar and 1 tablespoon maple syrup together in a small bowl.

Step 6

Place bacon on the wire rack on the baking sheet.

Step 7

Bake in the preheated oven for 10 minutes. Flip bacon and cook until about 2/3 cooked, 5 to 10 minutes more. Flip bacon again and baste the tops with brown sugar-syrup mixture; bake for 5 minutes. Flip bacon and baste the other side; bake for 5 minutes. Continue this process until bacon is crisp and coating has candied and all the brown sugar-syrup mixture is used, 5 to 10 minutes more.

Step 8

Turn off oven and sprinkle sea salt over both sides of bacon; let sit for a few minutes in the oven. Chop bacon into bite-size pieces.

Step 9

Preheat oven to 200 degrees F (95 degrees C). Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper. Drizzle 1 1/2 teaspoons maple syrup over the parchment paper, keeping the drops dime-size or smaller.

Step 10

Bake in the preheated oven until drops are bubbling and height of each drop is less than half of it was in the beginning, about 1 hour. Cool on baking sheet until stiff yet slightly sticky.

Step 11

Stir chilled custard and pour into ice cream maker; start churning. Start adding bacon bits, a few at a time, to churning custard about halfway through. Once the custard is getting thicker, add the syrup drops, 1 or 2 at a time to ensure they are evenly dispersed. Continue churning until custard is thick. Transfer to a freezer-safe container and freeze until it sets, 2 to 4 hours.