Afoggato - Chocolate coffee ice cream with espresso

I can clearly remember my first introduction to Afoggato.  It was ages ago.  We were on holiday in Italy with one of A's brothers and family. We each had our own apartment in a little villa outside Venice. It was lovely, a bit crumbling and shabby. It was by a beach on the far side of the lagoon so we had to take the water taxi into St Marks Square to sightsee or eat out... just like in The Tourist. We'd invited everyone back to our appartment for ice-cream.  I suggested pouring Amaretto liqueur over the lovely gelato that we'd bought. A's brother asked why not pour coffee over it too!  Which not being familiar with Afoggato I thought was a bit weird...until I tasted it.
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...The combination of bitter coffee and creamy sweet ice cream is delicious.

I'd totally forgotten about it until I was deciding what to make for this months We Should Cocoa Challenge organised by chocolate log blog. Wednesday was a hot sunny day and all I could think of was  chocolate ice-cream. So when I realised the mystery ingredient for this months challenge was coffee I had to make Afoggato in memory of a lovely holiday.


And the best bit is that this ice cream is so easy to make no difficult egg custards or complicated list of ingredients. It tastes great and because I was experimenting for a dairy intolerant sister whose visiting this weekend I made it with coconut milk...so even people who can't eat dairy can enjoy it...

For my Chocolate Coffee Coconut Milk Ice Cream you will need:

• One can of organic coconut milk
• One third of a cup of cocoa powder
• Three tablespoons of runny honey (you could also use agave syrup but as it's sweeter I would add less and taste before adding more)
• Three tablespoons of espresso coffee
• A little liqueur. I used honey rum liqueur.
• Vanilla extract 
• Made espresso to serve

Method:

1. Simply mix the first six ingredients together. Give a good old stir and then pour into the basin of an ice cream maker following the instructions.
2. If you don't have an ice cream maker place the mixture into a dish and freeze for a couple of hours.  Remove and give it a good mix to prevent ice crystals forming. Return and freeze for another hour.
3. Remove and scoop spoonfuls into glasses or espresso cups.
4. Make up a pot or cups of espresso and pour over the icecream. Serving with more espresso for a double coffee whammy and some kind of small sweet biscuits like amaretti or biscotti...mmm...

I don't think that ice cream made with coconut milk has quite the same smooth texture as with cream but it has great flavour and is really easy to make and works really well as Afoggato...definitely one to make again...

Linking over to the kitchenmaid blog today where Lucy is hosting this months We Should Cocoa challenge.