Roasted Plum Popsicles

Sweet, juicy plums roasted with brown sugar and vanilla bean become a caramelised bite of deliciousness. Once pureed and ribboned through a creamy vanilla no-churn ice-cream base and frozen, you’ll have a popsicle that you won’t forget in a long time. Roasted plum popsicles will become a favourite change of season treat.

The thing about roasting fruit is that even if your stoned fruit isn’t ripe, you’ll still intensify their flavour by cooking them. Coat them with brown sugar and vanilla extract prior to baking, and all the sweet juices that come out of the fruit as they cook will form a beautiful fruity caramelised sauce. It transforms them in such a short time into a simple, memorable dessert.

I’ve kept it simple and only add a couple of ingredients to the plums (brown sugar and vanilla extract), but you could add some honey, cinnamon, ginger or star anise to add to the complexity of the flavour.

Roasting the plums in this way and then drizzling them with the caramel sauce and sprinkling with candied hazelnuts creates a flavour bomb of a popsicle treat. I know it’s technically the end of Summer but this is yet another one of those transitional recipes that works so well during this change of seasons. The fruity kick of summer married with the deeper caramel tones of Autumn. Are you with me? I can tell you that my kids absolutely loved these Roasted Plum Popsicles. They were a winner with all of them! Even Coco!

How to roast plums

Before we get onto the ice-cream part of these Roasted Plum Popsicles, we need to roast the plums.

It’s dead simple. Like seriously…so easy. Only three ingredients needed:

• plums- one of my favourite late summer/Autumn fruits

• brown sugar- the molasses only adds to the caramelisation of the plums when roasting

• vanilla extract- is there ever a reason to not have vanilla extract? All those vanilla bean specks will only intensify the sweetness of the plums.

You first have to toss in the brown sugar and vanilla extract until all the fruit has been coated.

Then lay cut side down on a baking tray. The heat from the metal tray will heat up the open side of the fruit allowing the juices to start running out and gradually caramelise with the brown sugar.

Roast for 20 minutes you’ll have a tray of oozing, sweet, sticky plums that will smell out of this world!

Onto the Ice-cream

Now I have a real love affair going on with no churn ice-cream. It’s simple, quick and fuss free. You can also add any flavour you like – keep it simple of make it fancy.

I’ve made my Salted Caramel Brownie Ice-cream before (recipe found here) and basically used the ice-cream base for this recipe. Case in point…it is so versatile.

Three ingredients. Three steps.

• whipped cream
• condensed milk
• canilla extract

1. Whip cream
2. Stir condensed milk and vanilla extract together
3. Fold cream into condensed milk mixture

That’s it. You now have a receptacle for all sorts of additions … caramel, chocolate, curd, purees, fruit… the list goes on. Or just leave it as is. Equally good!

Roasted plum ice-cream

Before we combine the two, you’ll need to puree that fruit. Add all the fruit (once it has cooled slightly) and the caramelised juice from the bottom of the tray into a food processor.

Blend until totally pureed. I then passed the puree through a sieve to remove the pulp. But this is an optional step. If you aren’t bothered by the skin then don’t bother.

Now pour the puree into the ice-cream base bowl. I like the colour variation of of seeing the white offset with the pink puree so I wanted to achieve that ribboned look. I folded the puree in just a couple of times to mix it slightly and then left it. But if you want it fully mixed then that’s also a great option. You’ll have the most gorgeous shade of pink!

To freeze, either pour into popsicle moulds like I did or pour into a freezer safe container and freeze as a block.

Extra, extra, extra- what to add to make these Roasted Plum Popsicles even more delicious.

Now we all know that I generally like to add a little something to make a dessert stand out from the pack. You could eat them plain, straight out of the mould….or you could drizzle them with caramel sauce and sprinkle them with chopped candied hazelnuts. I mean seriously, not only do they look STUNNING but the addition send these over the edge good. You have to try this recipe.

For more ice-cream recipes:

Salted Caramel Brownie Ice-cream. Recipe found here.

Roasted Strawberry Mascarpone Ice-cream. What can I say, I like roasting fruit! Recipe found here.

If you don’t fancy a cold treat, then try out Delia’s Plum and Almond Buttermilk Cobbler. I have had it and it’s divine. Recipe found here.

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