When figs become heavy with their honeyed sweetness, there's nothing better than eating them straight out of hand. But there may come a time when you need to make figs into something else before the end of their very short window. And that's when this Fresh Fig Ice Cream recipe comes in handy, extending their soft sweet season into a rich, luxurious fall and winter. Shall we?
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What Ingredients You Need for Fig Ice Cream
- Figs, 2 pounds fresh, obviously!
- Water, ½ cup filtered
- Sugar, ½ cip
- Lemon, 1 lemon for zest and juice
- Cream. 1 cup
- Salt, a pinch
What Kind of Figs Do You Use for Ice Cream
tl;dr Use whatever kind of fresh figs are available, whether black mission, brown Turkey, green Adriatic, tiger stripe, or any of the other variety! I used black Mission figs because they make the darkest purple color for the ice cream.
The figs we are most familiar with and are most widely available in grocery stores are the dark purple Black Mission Figs and the lighter brownish-green Brown Turkey Figs. However, there are actually hundreds, maybe even thousands, of varieties of figs! Here are the varieties you might come across in grocery stores. They vary in color, flavor, and sweetness, but all of them work for the best fig recipes:
Black, Brown, Purple Figs
- Black Mission Figs. Recognizable by their uniformly toned, very dark purple, almost black skins. When ripe, Black Mission Figs are some of the sweetest!
- Brown Turkey Figs, dark brown sometimes spotted or mottled with green, usually the largest in average size
Green Figs
- Adriatic Figs, light green skin, pale pink to near white interior, sometimes called a "white fig"
- Calimyrna Figs. light, pale green California cultivar of the Mediterranean Smyrna fig, often found dried to concentrate their flavor
- Kadota Figs, bright green skin outside, vibrant pink on the inside, not quite as sweet as the others, making these great in preparations where you can add some sweetness like baking
- Sierra Figs. a California original variety, pale green skin outside, pale pink inside
- Tiger Stripe Figs aka Candy Stripe or Panache. Yellow green vertically striped skin outside, bright pink inside.
What Exactly are Figs?
Though we eat it like a fruit, a fig is technically a flower. Or rather, an entire bouquet of flowers that grows on trees! Let me explain. A single fig is a group of tiny inverted flowers growing inside a pod called an inflorescence. Each fig contains hundreds of flowers, and each flower produces a small seed, sort of similar to the structure of raspberries, blackberries, and strawberries.
Because of where they originated, fresh figs are mostly associated with Mediterranean diets and cuisines. They now grow in California, which has a similar climate to the warm, dry climate of the Mediterranean.
When are Figs in Season
Figs are Clingy. Just Like Me.
Figs are usually considered a summer fruit because they are officially in season May to November. But technically, figs have two very short "seasons" on either end of summer. The first season can start as early as May, depending on the variety of fig and where you are located. Then, figs sort of disappear during the height of the summer season and come back for their second season which starts in late August and can go as late as November. I have always considered figs a very late-summer fruit!
Earlier in the season, the first fresh figs aren't quite as sweet and luscious as they will be later in the summer, or better yet, after a couple of months of swelling up in the summer sun. Soft and sensitive, they just won't let go.
If you have fig trees or neighbors with fig trees, you know this cycle well.
How to Make Fresh Fig Ice Cream
When I made this Fresh Fig Ice Cream, I think I pulled several recipes, culled the best elements from them, and combined them into whatever came out on the other side. Essentially, it's fig compote from David Lebovitz combined with a basic vanilla ice cream recipe (that doesn't use eggs).
The irony is, of course, that as much as I wish I could stop time, even slow it down, I could hardly wait for the figs to cook down into the compote, was impatient while it cooled, and the 12 hours to freeze the ice cream couldn't come fast enough.
Cut off woody stem ends from 2 pounds of fresh figs and roughly chop.
Combine chopped figs, ½ cup of filtered water, and fine zest of lemon in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then immediately turn heat down to simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the figs are tender and breaking down, about 10 minutes.
Add ½ cup of sugar and pinch of sea salt and continue to cook until the figs reach a jam-like consistency. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.
Combine cooled fig mixture with 1 cup heavy cream and juice from previously zested lemon, should be about 2 tablespoons. Place mixture in refrigerator until completely chilled through, at least 2 hours, up to overnight.
Transfer chilled fig and cream mixture into ice cream maker and freeze per the Ice cream maker manufacturer's instructions.
Transfer Fresh Fig Ice Cream to freezer-safe container with an air-tight lid. Ice Cream can be kept in freezer for up to 3 months.
Pro-tip: To take a scoop of Fresh Fig Ice Cream over the top, drizzle it with a little bit of very good olive oil! Might sound weird, but trust me.
Fig FAQs
Ah, I've been waiting for the billion dollar question! Despite what sensationalist click-bait social would have you believe, there are no wasps inside common figs grown in California. Those Black Mission, Brown Turkey, and sometimes Tiger Stripe figs you see at grocery stores? No wasps. Figs that are self-pollinating, like those listed above, DO NOT rely on fig wasps for pollination.
There is, however, one variety of fig that currently does use pollinators, though it is being phased out, the Calimyrna/Smyrna. This variety is being phased out of California by a similar variety of fig that is self-pollinating and will not rely on outside pollinators.
YES! The skin on all varieties of figs is edible! It is possible to peel the skins off of figs, though it's totally unnecessary.
Figs are ripe and ready to eat when they give under gentle pressure from the pads of your fingers, are just barely starting to wrinkle, feel heavy for their size, and even better if the flower end opposite the stem, is starting to open slightly and maybe even weep some juice.
Because truly ripe and ready to eat figs are fairly fragile, they are often picked off the tree when they are not quite super-soft to avoid bruising during transport. You can leave just slightly under-ripe figs on the countertop to ripen a little more. However, figs do have to get past a certain ripening point on the tree for them to continue ripening off the tree. If the figs at the store are very hard and lightweight, they may stay that way so look for something else.
The white liquid is a natural, normal sap from the fig tree. The sap is not poisonous, though some people may have an allergy to it.
Best Recipes with Fresh Figs
See this post for a more complete list of recipes to make with fresh figs, with my favorites here:
Fresh Fig Ice Cream Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 pounds fresh figs stems removed and chopped into small pieces
- 1 large lemon
- ½ cup sugar
- 1 cup heavy cream
- ½ teaspoon lemon juice
Instructions
- Combine chopped figs, ½ cup of filtered water, and fine zest of lemon in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then immediately turn heat down to simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the figs are tender and breaking down, about 10 minutes.
- Add the sugar and continue to cook until the figs reach a jam-like consistency. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.
- Combine fig mixture with heavy cream and lemon juice, Chill in refrigerator until completely chilled through, at least 2 hours, up to overnight.
- Transfer chilled fig and cream mixture into ice cream maker and freeze per the Ice cream maker manufacturer's instructions.
Notes
Food for Afterthoughts
Sunday. Do you remember Sunday? Only yesterday.
“Only.” The word, heavy, slow, so many different meanings, makes me sigh.
Only one day, but somehow Sunday feels like forever ago.
Sunday was a gorgeous day. Bright. Sunny. It doesn’t say much to call it a gorgeous day though, since this is southern California. It’s gorgeous every day, which is why it’s hard to remember it. When there are no events, distinguishing features, all the days are the same. When every day is the same, they all run together. It’s hard to keep track of time.
Really, from any other day, Sunday was no different.
Except that it was.
Anywhere else, sunshine is deceptive. You sense the sun in the bright blue sky through the window, only to step outside into the dead of winter. Sunshine in southern California, though, is true year-round to a 72 degree temperature. Sunshine always means warmth. Sometimes it means heat. Sometimes, so much heat, it burns.
No, the sun is not deceptive in southern California, but in Orange County on Sunday, the sun betrayed in a different way.
When I woke up Sunday morning, it was still so dark that we thought it was the middle of the night. It was so dark, I thought maybe it was still…yesterday. Had time stopped? Even just slowed down? No, it was already…today, autumn-dark at 6 AM, right on schedule, right on the never slowing, never ceasing seasonal non-stopwatch that ticks and turns in a universal vacuum. As I made my way meticulously around the apartment in the pre-dawn darkness, I did things that contradicted one another. I straightened up some papers on “my desk,” but pulled a few things out of the fridge so I wouldn’t forget them later. I was disoriented, even in a place in which I had spent so much time. Maybe the three fitful hours of sleep hadn’t been enough. Maybe I was having trouble accepting the reality of change.
I sighed, asked out loud if the change truly was inevitable in a whisper that no one heard.
As total darkness through the window started to dissolve into that eerie glow just before sunrise, I slipped back into bed for what I knew would be a last moment of bliss. Never before had I been so sensitive to the passage of time. I closed my eyes, unrealistically hopeful that maybe, time would stop.
Time didn’t stop. As I always say, you can’t fight time. You can fight Morris Day and The Time, but you can’t fight time. I woke up again for the second time on Sunday morning, not to the early darkness, but to a 9 am brightness that had pierced through the tiny cracks in the blinds. I let out a sigh that probably sounded like a breathy “fuck.” Today is – inevitably – today. Yesterday, last night, had already happened, and never before had 9th grade English been so applicable. The tense of “–ed” is past. Past. Passed. Whatever has passed never comes back.
When we surrendered to fully opening the blinds, the beauty of the day was overwhelming; I knew it was warm outside. If you were only watching, like I was, the branches sway against an impossibly blue sky through the window, even catching a glimpse of the kids running by in shorts down below on the perfectly paved street, you’d never guess – I looked at my calendar and was startled by the realization – that it was...already...almost…October.
How had it already become AlmostOctober? September is hanging on by a thread. What happened to August? July for that matter?
Summer had escaped and I hadn’t even noticed.
Autumn had crept in and I hadn't even noticed.
Signs of fall, as they always are every season, every year, for eternity, are there. For everyone else. Temperatures drop. Colors change. Individually, the physical indicators may be imperceptible, but taken together by all five senses, the impact is undeniable. In southern California, we don't have that full array of changes. There is only a decrease in the daylight hours, hardly a physical change, and day to day, hardly noticeable.
The southern California sun had deceived me. Shining so bright, the sun had blinded me to school busses on the street, candy aisles dressed up for Halloween, and hundreds of pictures of fall foods. As late as September, the sun felt so warm that even as its time in the sky ticked shorter and shorter toward the equinox, the intensity of the heat still felt like the solstice.
Even if I could fight time, the battle was already history.
----------
Sunday.
Really, from any other day, Sunday was no different.
Sunday was a gorgeous day. When we walked outside, arms laden with bags, it wasn't different from any other Sunday, the end of just another weekend. It still felt like summer but this time I thought I noticed that the sun was slightly lower in the sky at 2 PM today than it was at 2 PM just a month ago. I couldn't decide whether to let the calendar register against the 80 degree summer air.
As we stood there outside, I could feel the light of the sunshine above, the heat radiating from the driveway below. It was warm. I didn't want to believe it was autumn; I didn't want to believe summer was over; I didn't want time to move.
I wanted to stay there, holding on, forever.
Damaris says
that fig ice cream looks amazing. did it taste good? I hope so. I hope it helped cheer you up from all the changes you're going through.
VirchulDoowite says
Mm-hm, that was Delicious.
VirchulDoowite says
Mm-hm, that was Delicious.
ila says
you write so pretty, that made me all teary-eyed. we need to go and grab some ice cream while the summer-is-doing-away heat still lasts.
taste memory says
there's everything to love about figs......fresh figs alone are enough....can only imagine fresh fig ice cream, what a delight!
Thought of soCal today because there was absolutely NO humidity - perfect 75 degrees of sunshine!
jkru says
The fact that you noticed the sun was lower in the sky at 2PM than it was a month ago makes you more perceptive than my Astronomy 101 students.
Also, that ice cream looks amazing!
Cindy. Lo. says
I never had fig ice cream before,
Wish I can get a bite of that!
I remember I once had a "miso" flavored ice cream in SF before,
It was...pretty...interesting..
Deidre says
I've never embraced the fig, finding it too much like the date or the prune in its pulpy purple brown nature but your words and pictures do make me curious...
Diana says
What a beautiful post. It is weird living in Southern California in this transitional period between summer and fall -- like we are all in flux, not sure what exactly to do or make of a half-assed seasonal change. Do I wear my fall clothes to work and sweat under the suffocating wool fabric? Or do I violate fashion rules and cling to my summer whites and tees? I think I prefer your response -- making and eating ice cream. Makes me wish that it could be the solution to all of life's problems.
Anonymous says
My only hesitation is that I love fresh figs so much I have never been able to put them into a recipe. I can always try though.
Hilary
http://www.smorgasbite.com
dlyn says
Fresh figs are a rarity here in the NE, and when I get my hands on them, I never have the self control to anything but chug them straight down. This looks and sounds fantastic.
nick says
I like this. Yummy.
Maure says
Sarah,
It's been a long time...far too long - and my, what a big, fancy
hi-steppin blogger girl you have become!
Just had to stop by and say congrats on your (continued) success, your writing and pics are still as sensual as their coquettish author.
I'll never look at figs in the same way...
Happy New Year!
Khürt says
Oh my God! That ice cream looks so good that I am now depressed. This person with diabetes can't have any. Boo hoo!
Kb18142 says
Khurt, I'm a diabetic and I make ice cream. Just don't add that cup (or more) of sugar that the recipes call for - figs are sweet enough on their own that it should turn out okay. Fruit, milk (or cream) and ice are all you need, esp with the new freezer ice cream makers