I don’t care what anyone says, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York is the best Christmas film.
Kevin eats such iconic foods throughout, so I had to come up with a recipe that epitomises his cheeky adventure and, of course, New York. Taking inspiration from that gigantic ice-cream Kevin orders in his hotel room, behold the mini-bar sundae, with chocolate chip cookies, pretzels and cheesecake marbled through. This is super-indulgent and addictive – a bit like the film.
Home Alone mini-bar ice-cream sundae
Prep 10 min
Chill Overnight
Cook 40 min
Serves: 10-12
360ml whole milk
465ml double cream
2 tsp vanilla bean paste or extract
5 egg yolks
75g soft light brown sugar
75g soft dark brown sugar
100g chocolate chip cookies, broken into chunks (optional)
2 large handfuls salted pretzels (optional)
For the New York cheesecake mix
300g cream cheese
90g icing sugar
125ml double cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
100g strawberry jam
To serve
Ice-cream wafers
Freeze-dried strawberries
50g dark chocolate, melted
Put the milk, cream and vanilla in a large saucepan. Bring to a gentle simmer over a medium heat and cook for three to four minutes.
Meanwhile, put the egg yolks and both sugars into a large bowl and mix until well combined. Turn up the heat under the milk mix, bring to a boil, then pour into the egg yolks in a slow and steady stream, whisking constantly. Pour the mix back into the saucepan and cook over a low heat, stirring continuously with a large, wooden spoon, until it coats the back of the spoon. Strain the custard through a fine sieve into a bowl.
Once the custard has cooled, put a layer of clingfilm directly on to the surface to prevent a skin forming, then pop in the fridge overnight to chill.
The next day, mix all the cheesecake ingredients apart from the jam, and combine with the chilled custard mix. Now either churn in an ice-cream machine according to the manufacturer’s instructions, or make it by hand: freeze the mix for an hour, then take it out of the freezer, churn by hand to break up any lumps, pop it back in the freezer for half an hour, churn and repeat until you’ve reached the right consistency. When you’re done, transfer to a freezer-proof container – or, to capture the ultimate Home Alone experience, a large loaf tin and fold in the cookie chunks and pretzels. Dollop on the jam and marble through with a table knife, then freeze until ready – about one to two hours.
To assemble, put scoops of the ice-cream into a bowl, top with wafers, a few freeze-dried strawberries and a squiggle of melted chocolate.
