Tiramisu Ice Cream
Rich mascarpone and espresso ice cream layered with coffee-dampened ladyfingers and cocoa.
Tested and worth making again.
Ingredients
Tap ingredients as you weigh them.
Mascarpone-espresso base
Ladyfinger mix-in and finish
The small print names the exact — often Dutch — products this recipe was calculated with. Equivalents work, but if a label differs materially, the formula deserves a recalculation.
Prepare
Cool the espresso
Brew enough strong espresso for the 35 g used in the base plus the ladyfingers and transfer loss. Cool it completely. Never add hot espresso to the mascarpone or Creami tub.
Disperse the guar
In a dry bowl, thoroughly combine the sugar, dextrose, guar gum, and salt. The guar must be evenly diluted through the other powders before it touches liquid.
Blend the liquids
Combine the whole milk, condensed milk, 35 g cooled espresso, and vanilla in a blending jug. Start an immersion blender, gradually sprinkle the dry mixture into the moving liquid, and blend for 30-45 seconds until uniform without deliberately whipping in air.
Add the mascarpone
Add the mascarpone and blend only until completely smooth. Cover and refrigerate for 4-12 hours to hydrate the guar and integrate the flavor. Stir gently before filling if any separation is visible.
Fill and freeze
Pour the approximately 427 g base into the NC300EU pint, confirm it is below the molded MAX FILL line, fit the storage lid, and freeze on a level surface for at least 24 hours.
Add the tested ladyfinger mix-in
After a successful main spin, make a central hole approximately 4 cm wide down to the bottom. Add two ladyfingers, breaking them only as needed to fit, and pour a small splash of cooled espresso over each. Run Mix-In once. This tested method distributes the tiramisu flavor well but chops the biscuits quite small; for larger pieces, fold them in by hand instead.
Finish and serve
Dust the ice cream with cocoa and optional grated chocolate. Soak one additional ladyfinger per serving in cooled espresso and serve it alongside or on top of the ice cream.
Spin plan
Confirm the frozen surface is level, there is no tall hard hump, the pint remains below MAX FILL, and the base is within -12°C to -25°C.
Run Ice Cream once.
If creamy, add the two coffee-dampened ladyfingers and run Mix-In once. If safely powdery or crumbly but otherwise workable, scrape the sides inward and proceed directly to Mix-In; otherwise RE-SPIN once before adding them. If too soft, do not keep spinning. Do not add liquid automatically.
Smooth leftovers flat before refreezing. When hard, rerun Ice Cream rather than RE-SPIN; another full cycle will grind the existing ladyfingers more finely.
Notebook
Test notes
2026-08-02 — dialed-in confirmation
- Follow-up feedback confirms that the recipe is consistently very good and is now considered dialed in for fresh-spin serving.
- No formula or process change is currently required.
- Refreeze behavior was not reported and remains untested.
2026-07-23 — first physical test
- Two pints were prepared; approximately half of the first processed pint was tasted.
- The base was highly successful: creamy texture, strong tiramisu identity, and no reported flavor or texture defects.
- Two ladyfingers received a small splash of coffee each and were incorporated with Mix-In.
- Mix-In chopped the ladyfingers quite small, but their flavor and texture still contributed positively to the ice cream.
- One additional coffee-soaked ladyfinger was served with the finished ice cream and worked especially well.
- The exact espresso absorbed by the ladyfingers was not measured and should be weighed during a future test.
- Later testing confirmed the fresh-spin recipe as dialed in. Refreeze and next-day processing behavior have not yet been evaluated.
Pending observations
- Refreeze result:
- Preferred biscuit method: fine Mix-In distribution or larger hand-folded pieces:
Formula details PAC, POD, and solids for the curious
- Convention
- Sucrose = 1; includes added sweeteners and lactose
- PAC
- 25.9
- POD
- 17.6
- Total solids
- 39.5%
- Fat
- 13%
- Protein
- 3.6%
- Formula values describe the approximately 427 g frozen base; post-spin ladyfingers, cocoa, and optional chocolate are excluded.
- PAC uses dextrose monohydrate FPDF 1.9, dextrose POD 0.75, and lactose PAC 1.0/POD 0.2.
- Nutrition is estimated from current product labels and includes approximately 25 g total ladyfingers and 3 g cocoa; optional chocolate is excluded.
- The base formula, tiramisu flavor, and immediate serving texture are considered dialed in after repeated positive feedback. Refreeze behavior remains untested.