Tea Ice Cream

Green Tea Ice Cream

The thought of green tea ice cream still comes as a shock to many people who have not yet been exposed to this unique delicacy. The seemingly strange creation is actually quite a treat once you get your selves to try it.

The ice cream is prepared using a mix of certain different types of green tea powder. The most popularly used leaves are from the maccha and matcha plant. Like the drink itself the ice cream treat also has its roots firmly established in the Japanese culture. Today we find that Japanese ice cream distributors are exporting the ice cream to all corners of the world.

The Japanese tradition

The Japanese have a very unusual way of serving green tea ice cream. There are times when you will find them to be enjoying it in a normal bowl like we all normally do. At other times it is actually served in between a monaka. This is a special Japanese sweet that consists of two sweet tasting wafers and have a special paste inside them. These wafers are then filled with the ice cream and the end result is somewhat like the ice cream sandwich, only this one has a green tea flavor.

The ice cream is made using traditional ingredients such as sugar, water and egg yolk. Milk and cream is an obvious addition to the making of the ice cream. The main ingredient however is the green tea it self which is obtained from the maccha tea.

Green tea ice cream does not only taste great rather the maccha leaves provide a very beautiful green hue that is very appealing to the eye. The green tea powder used to make this ice cream is something that is found in almost every home kitchen in Japan. In fact you will find green tea ice cream to be ready and kept frozen in many homes of Japan.

Homemade Green Tea Ice Cream

In recent years the popularity of green tea has escaped the boundaries of Japan. Amongst the various green tea products that are now flourishing on a global scale is green tea ice cream. This is probably one of those green tea products that is not as commonly available as others are.

This is the reason why we find many people trying their luck at making the ice cream themselves. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to make green tea ice cream at home and you can easily accomplish the task if you follow the right guidelines.

For starters it is a good idea to make green tea ice cream using normal vanilla ice cream as the base and then adding green tea powder to it. Although you may not conceive this to be the authentic green tea ice cream, it is the closest possible rendition of the ice cream that you can manage on your own.

What To Do If You Do Not Like Green Tea?

Almost everyone has heard of the great health benefits of consuming green tea. Believe it or not, a large number of those people do not like the taste of green tea. So one question I get asked a lot is:
What can I do to incorporate green tea into my diet if i do not like the taste of green tea?

Fortunately there are a number of methods to consume green tea without actually tasting the green tea. I will outline two solutions below.

1) Make regular (or black) iced tea at a ratio of five to 1

If you do not like the taste of iced green tea, hopefully you do like black iced tea. Black iced tea is the standard iced tea most people are familiar with. It is a strong flavor, much stronger than green tea.

The strength of the flavor of black iced tea makes it perfect to slip a little green tea into without being able to taste the green tea.

Here is a recipe. In a 3 quart pot, heat water to just before boiling,or bring it to a boil and turn off the heat till it stops boiling. Take five small Lipton black tea bags and one small green tea bag and steep the bags in the water for four minutes. The result is a regular iced tea with green tea benefits without the taste.

Black tea has health benefits as well, so your drink will be an overall healthy one. If so inclined, the next time you make iced tea with this method, use two bags of green tea and see if the taste offends you. Keep experimenting till you find the right ratio of black to green tea while striving to use as many green tea bags in your iced green tea hybrid.

2) Eat green tea

Yes you can eat green tea. I recommend finding a source of food quality powdered green tea. You can check out EatGreenTea.com for quality food grade edible green tea.

Once you have a source of organic edible green tea, go nuts. You can add it to a lot of things that will mask the flavor of the green tea.

Examples include: tomato sauce, smoothies, soups (creamy ones mask the taste better), mashed potatoes, cereal, oatmeal, and yogurt.

These are just examples, the possibilities are endless. If you are worried about the green tea flavoring the food think about this. One teaspoon of edible powdered green tea has as many health benefits as 30 cups of green tea. So a couple dashes probably equals a couple cups of brewed tea. the point is you do not need to eat a lot of green tea leaves to get the benefits, and by not having to add too much to your food you have less of a chance of effecting the flavor of almost any food.

If you are planning to eat green tea, do yourself a favor, and look for an organic edible green tea. Eating pesticides or fertilizer may offset the health benefits of green tea.