Vegan Dulce de Leche Gelato with Coconut

There is caramel and molasses at the front, coconut underneath, and a thick, slow melt that never once reads as a stand-in for something dairy.

What Argentina and the River Plate do with a tin of condensed milk, cook it slowly until the sugar browns and the whole thing thickens, is the method being copied here without the cow. Vegetable condensed milk is the right starting point because it is structurally the same object: sugar and fat already concentrated together at 71.5 percent solids and 46.7 percent sugars, so 180 g per kilo bring around 84 g of sugars on their own and free sucrose falls back to 35 g. Muscovado supplies the molasses note a weaker vegetable Maillard will not build alone, and soy milk is in there purely for protein, which the condensed milk has none of.

It also explains the number that looks strange at first glance: 302 g of added water. When the flavour ingredient is a concentrate, the water has to be deliberately put back. Water closes at 61.7 percent and solids at 38.3, the lowest solids in this set and still comfortably inside a 35 to 42 band.

The structural gap is protein. Vegetable condensed milk has none, and the base needs at least 1.5 percent. Cashew paste could supply it, but each gram of cashew brings nearly half a gram of fat, and the ceiling is 13 percent. So 187 g of soy milk, at 3.5 percent protein against only 2.1 percent fat, is the protein lever, cashew stays contained at 83 g, and the sheet closes at 2.51 percent protein with fat at 10.52. 25 g of muscovado covers the molasses note that vegetable browning, which is weaker, will not produce on its own.

Ingredients

Makes 1000 g of finished base.

Method

Condensed milk caramelised alone at 105 to 110 C, dissolved into the warm base, aged 8 to 12 hours

1. 1Whisk every dry ingredient together first: sugars, milk powder, stabiliser and salt. Dry-blending them stops the stabiliser clumping when it meets liquid.
2. 2Warm the liquids to 40 C (104 F), then rain the dry mix in while whisking hard.
3. 3Heat to 82 C (180 F) and hold for 2 minutes so the stabiliser hydrates.
4. 4Off the heat, whisk in the paste, then blend 60 seconds so the fat emulsifies instead of separating.
5. 5Chill in an ice bath to under 5 C (41 F) within 2 hours. Slow cooling is where bacteria and coarse crystals both start.
6. 6Age 6 to 12 hours in the fridge under 5 C (41 F). This is when the stabiliser and the milk protein take up water.
7. 7Freeze in a shallow metal pan 2 to 3 cm deep, breaking the crystals with a fork every 30 to 40 minutes, 4 to 6 times.
8. 8Freeze firm, then temper 10 to 15 minutes in the fridge before scooping.

The balance

All six against the professional range for Vegan Base.

Protein 2.51 percent and fat 10.52 percent are the pair that decides everything else. The flavour ingredient contributes zero protein, so the 1.5 percent floor has to be met by ingredients that are not the flavour, and the cheapest way to buy protein without buying fat is soy milk at 3.5 percent protein to 2.1 percent fat, the best protein to fat ratio available on the plant side. Try to reach the floor with cashew instead and fat hits the 13 percent ceiling before protein clears 1.5. On the sugar side, 180 g of condensed milk already carries around 84 g of sugars, so the sheet closes at 19.81 percent sugars with only 35 g of free sucrose, and the 50 g of dextrose is there for PAC rather than for sweetness: PAC 253.09 in a 210 to 300 band with POD at 184.84 under a 195 ceiling. Inulin drops to 2 g on this one, because the condensed milk is already supplying the dry extract that inulin has to cover for elsewhere.

If it goes wrong

Allergens: milk, soy, tree nuts

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