Cruising Femail on the Daily Mail’s site, as I often to, I came across a great recipe for homemade ice cream which both intrigued and excited me. And made me a little hungry. I’ve never tried to make homemade ice cream before or anything in ‘that family’ so it was a little daunted but it looked so nice! So off I went and had a little go.

Jo Pratt’s creamy vanilla ice cream

Serves:8

Ingredients

- 300ml (10fl oz) milk
- 1 vanilla pod, split, or 1/2tsp vanilla extract
- 4 large egg yolks
- 125g (4 1/2oz) caster sugar
- 300ml (10fl oz) double cream
Method

1) Pour the milk into a saucepan, add the vanilla pod or extract and gently bring to the boil.
2) Beat together the egg yolks and sugar until they are pale and creamy. Stir in the milk, return the liquid to the saucepan and stir continuously over a low heat until it thickens and just starts to coat the back of your spoon (it should be the consistency of double cream). Make sure you don’t boil the custard because it may separate and curdle. if you feel it is getting too hot, remove from the heat and just continue stirring until it thickens.
3) Remove the pan from the heat, take out the vanilla pod, if using (scraping out the seeds first), stir in the cream and leave to cool. leave the custard base to cool and then pour the mixture in a container (ideally metal) and freeze, beating well at 1 hour intervals, until scoopable.
Hectic Mum top tip: Get some sprinkles or chocolate sauce for the kids and strawberries or raspberries for you - while they’re still in season!