We’ve all had an ice cream sandwich before – but this takes things to the next level.
Don’t just save this dish for Easter, as it’s delicious all-year round.
Hot cross bun with salted caramel ice cream
Ingredients:
(Makes 1 sandwich)
1 hot cross bun (whatever your favourite is – I like them all, but not so much when they have additions of chocolate and things), plus an extra ½ a bun
1tbsp caster (superfine) or light brown sugar
A squeeze of pomegranate molasses or REALLY old balsamic vinegar
1 huge scoop of salted caramel ice cream
Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 140°C (275°F). Didn’t see that coming in an ice-cream sandwich, did you?
2. Toast the hell out of the extra half a hot cross bun in the toaster, let it go cold and blitz it to little chunks in a food processor. Put those on a baking tray and sprinkle all over with the sugar, mix it all up and bang the tray in the oven. Every 10 minutes get the tray out and push all the crumbs round with a spatula. Do this for about 20–30 minutes, then tip the crumbs onto a piece of greaseproof paper, scraping everything off the tray with the spatula. Let them go cold and pop them back in the food processor for another quick whizz until they’re mostly the size of really big breadcrumbs. They should be super crunchy and delicious, not burned.
3. Take the fresh, whole hot cross bun and cut a slit most of the way into it along one of the sides. You’re making a pocket in it. Open that up as best you can and squish the insides a bit with your finger. Drizzle the pomegranate molasses or old balsamic inside.
4. Take a tablespoon of ice cream at a time, roll it in your cold, hot-cross bun crumbs, pressing some into it, then spoon the ice cream inside the bun. Keep going like this until you can’t get any more ice cream in. Pop this on the shelf of your freezer for 10 minutes to firm everything back up a bit. Get it out and squeeze and mould the bread (carefully, without crushing it or driving the ice cream out somewhere). Last thing is to roll the exposed ice cream on the front in more of the crumbs and get stuck in.
Max’s World Of Sandwiches by Max Halley and Benjamin Benton is published by Hardie Grant Books, priced £25. Photography by Robert Billington. Available now.
