Chocolate Ice Cream Bon Bons Recipe

Preparing for an extended vacation, I was looking to get rid of all the odds and ends in my fridge when I came across scraps of chocolate and about a quart of rich chocolate ice cream. Good chocolate ice cream comes at a premium price here in Singapore, so I was not keen to toss it, or even eat it (unusual for me, but I'd just packed my bathing suit). Instead, I decided to turn it into a fun, last-minute dessert of ice cream bon bons, and hand it off to my lucky neighbors.

Ice cream bon bons are nothing more than balls of ice cream coated in chocolate. They're so simple to make they almost don't even need a recipe. They look amazing and are a great way to serve ice cream without having it immediately melt all over the place, and, even better, they can be made ahead. Once the chocolate shell is set, you can store them in the freezer for a few days, stacked between sheets of parchment and in an airtight container.

Before you start, make sure to pre-chill the pan to keep the ice cream balls from melting into a puddle as soon as you scoop them. And do make sure to use a decent quality ice cream here—the denser the better. Fluffy ice creams full of air don't freeze hard enough to enable you to dip them into the melted chocolate without immediately melting themselves. I used a heavy-duty tablespoon to scoop the ice cream into rough mounds (I slightly softened the ice cream first). After freezing, I formed the mounds into rough ball shapes before dipping in melted chocolate. Don't stress—they don't have to be perfect. The rustic, organic shapes are really appealing and oh so delicious.

Did the batch make it to my neighbors? Nope. We ate half and stored the rest for our return.