Salted Pretzel Ice Cream in a Chocolate Cake Crumb Pie Crust

Chocolate Cake Crumb Pie Crust

Preheat the oven to 350° F (176° C).

Cut up chocolate cake (sans frosting) into chunks workable for a food processor and add them to the bowl. More than 2 cups is fine but don't go overboard.

Pulse the cake a few times until the chunks are mostly broken down into crumbs.

Drizzle the melted butter over the crumbs and pulse a few times to thoroughly combine.

Lightly but purposefully press the crumbs into a pie dish and bake for about 15 minutes. The crust will not be crispy.

If you notice gaps in the pie crust after removing it from the oven, let it cool slightly then mush the crumbs back to fill. Let it cool completely before use.

Salted Pretzel Ice Cream

Pour the milk into a small bowl and add the preztels, giving a quick stir and press to make sure they're coated in milk. Once they've soaked through, break the pretzels up. Or break them ahead of time. Let this mixture soak for about an hour and a half total. More is fine.

Pour the infused pretzel milk through a fine mesh strainer into a saucepan, making sure to squeeze out as much milk as possible from the pretzels. Turn the heat onto low to warm the milk.

Prepare an ice bath by setting a small bowl into a larger one and fill the larger bowl with ice. Add a little water to the large bowl (this makes the ice bath colder).

Once small bubbles start forming on the edges of the milk, combine the eggs, egg yolk, and sugars. Whisk briskly until the sugars are combined and the mixture turns a pale yellow. Don't do this ahead of time or the sugar will burn the eggs.

Temper the egg mixture with the warmed milk by adding a little milk and whisking constantly. Add more milk, whisk, more milk, until the egg mixture has warmed.

Add the egg mixture to the warmed milk in the saucepan, turn the heat to medium, and stir constantly until the mix turns thicker than a pudding. This happens quickly so stay close.

Remove the saucepan from the heat, add the heavy cream, stirring to combine. Pour the mix through the fine mesh strainer into the awaiting small bowl in the ice bath.

Let cool a bit and cover the custard directly on the surface with plastic wrap. Let cool completely.

Once the mixture has cooled, add it to the ice cream machine, and follow the manufacturer's directions.

To assemble the pie:

When the ice cream has finished churning. either scoop it into a freezer safe container, stirring in or adding to the top the chopped chocolate and broken pretzel bits or add all the ice cream to a pie crust.

Top the pie with the chopped chocolate and broken pretzel bits, cover and freeze for 4 hours before serving.