Pistachio-White Chocolate Milkshake
This Pistachio-White Chocolate Milkshake uses pistachio paste and white chocolate ganache (basically a deconstructed pistachio creme) to give it the perfect creamy texture and balance between nuttiness and sweetness.
Backstory… I LOVE pistachios. Like, and unhealthy amount. So, when I saw a pistachio milkshake on the menu at Bobby’s Burger Palace in the Atlanta Airport, of course I needed to have it. Not where you expected this to go was it? lol.
Long story short, I don’t travel often enough and needed this milkshake in my life more often. Enter recipe development and the ensuing copycat recipe. It took me a minute to figure out the secret to this magical milkshake was white-chocolate ganache. Just pistachio paste made the milkshake too nutty, and it was thinner than I wanted. The white-chocolate ganache mellowed the roasted taste and added the creaminess I was craving. In a word, perfection!
Get the Recipe: Pistachio-White Chocolate Milkshake
Ingredients
Pistachio-White Chocolate Milkshake
- ¼ cup whole milk
- 1 cup vanilla ice cream
- 3 tablespoons pistachio paste
- 2 tablespoons white chocolate ganache
Pistachio Paste
- ¾ cup shelled pistachios, "pre-salted and roasted" , (see FAQs)
- ⅓ cup almond flour
- 1 tablespoon + 1teaspoon water
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ teaspoon almond extract, (optional)
- 1-2 tablespoons neutral oil, (canola, safflower, grapeseed, etc)
White Chocolate Ganache
- 4 oz (½ cup) heavy (double) whipping cream
- 8 oz (2, 4oz or 113.5g) white chocolate bars, chopped
Equipment
- kitchen scale
- measuring Cups
- 1-2 small sauce pot(s)
- 1 spatula
- 1 baking sheet or large plate optional
- Measuring spoons
- 1 high-powered blender or food processor
- 1 cutting board
- 1 chef knife
- 1 small bowl
- 1 Whisk
Instructions
Ingredient Disclaimers
- Pistachio Paste: You can purchase pistachio paste at the store or you can make your own. I've provided an easy recipe (makes 1 cup of paste) for the purposes of this post, but if you want to have a smoother, richer, and more vibrant pistachio paste, check out my full Pistachio Paste recipe post. (Making the most intensive version of pistachio paste will add up to 2 hours to this recipe.)
- Vanilla Ice Cream: The same goes with vanilla ice cream. I purchased a custard-style vanilla ice cream for this recipe. Most store-bought ice creams are this style but check the carton/tub for egg yolks as an ingredient to be sure. If you want to make homemade vanilla ice cream, use my Browned Butter Bourbon Ice Cream recipe and just leave out the toasted milk powder and bourbon. (Making your own ice cream will add up to 8 hours to this recipe.)
Pistachio Paste
- First, measure and pour the sugar and water into a small sauce pot and turn the stove to medium-high heat. Once the sugar has dissolved and temperature of the syrup reaches 245°F (118.5°C), turn off the heat and add in the shelled pistachios. Stir everything around with a spatula. The syrup will turn hard and sandy as it coats the nuts and cools. Once the pistachios are coated and the sugar has fully crystallized, pour the pistachios onto a baking sheet or plate and spread them out to cool.
- When cooled, add the candied pistachios, almond flour, and almond extract to a food processor or high-powered blender. Turn on the processor for about 2 minutes and let it grind the nut mixture down to a coarse meal. when you see it start to clump, add in the oil a ½ tbsp (7.5ml) at a time. The meal will slowly become a thick paste. Depending on how thinned you want the pistachio paste, you can add more neutral oil (½ tbsp – 7.5ml) or even some amaretto or pistachio extract (¼ tsp – 1.25ml) a little at a time. Add any additional salt, to taste, and set the paste aside to cool off.
White Chocolate Ganache
- For the ganache, chop the chocolate into small pieces and place them in a medium sized bowl. Then, heat the cream until it just begins to simmer (around 180°F or 82°C). Pour the heated liquid over the chocolate and let it sit for 30-60 seconds. Then, whisk until all of the chocolate has fully melted. Set aside or in the refrigerator to cool.
Pistachio-White Chocolate Milkshake
- To make the milkshake, add the listed ingredients to a blender and blend on high for 1 minute. Pour into a glass and enjoy.
Notes
- This recipe makes more than 1 milkshake worth of pistachio paste and white chocolate ganache. In a sealed container, the ganache will last up to 2 weeks and the pistachio paste up to 1 month in your refrigerator.
- Any part of this pistachio-white chocolate milkshake recipe can be scaled up or down, as long as the ingredient ratios stay the same.
- If you halve the ganache recipe, you might need a double boiler (a heat safe bowl nested into a small pot with about 1in (2.5cm) of water.) to get the chocolate to melt fully. 1/4 cup of heated cream added to a bowl might not stay hot enough to melt the chocolate.
- If you use almond extract for the pistachio paste, it does add a sweet nuttiness that I think enhances the pistachio flavor. However, if you decide to add it, do not add more than the recipe calls for. The almond extract can quickly overpower the pistachio and all that work for pistachio paste will be lost. It will still taste good, but it won’t be what you were working towards.
Nutrition
Frequently Asked Questions
There are three ways to get a naturally greener milkshake:
1. The fastest way to get a greener color is to pick through the pistachios while measuring them and make sure you are choosing the greenest ones. Leaving out any dull or brown pistachios will go a long way.
2. You can also blanch and peel the skins off your pistachios at home. This will add some additional steps to the pistachio paste process. But the purple and brown skins won’t mess with the overall color of the milkshake. (I did this to my pistachios for the recipe photos.)
3. Lastly, you can also purchase pistachios that already have the skins removed. Typically, these are raw and unsalted, so it will add an extra step and some additional salt to recipe, but the color will be beautiful without any peeling.
If you don’t feel like sourcing raw pistachios, but also want the skins off the pistachios for better color, do this:
Fill a medium sized pot with water and place it on your stovetop. Turn the heat on high and bring the water to a rolling boil. While that heats, fill a bowl with half ice and water and set it aside. When the water is boiling it’s time to blanch the shelled pistachios. Gently add the nuts to the boiling water using a spider or fine mesh strainer and let them cook until you see the skins start to lift away from the nuts. This should take between 1-3 minutes. If you cook the nuts too long, they will turn into mush so make sure to watch the pot and take them out as soon as possible.
When the pistachios are ready to leave the water, scoop them out and immediately dunk them into the cold, ice water. Let them sit for 3-5 minutes in the ice water and then scoop them out and place them onto one half of an open kitchen towel.
Fold the other half of the towel over the pistachios and roll it back and forth, to remove and/or begin separating the loosened skins from the nuts. Uncover the pistachios and finish removing the skins until they are all fully peeled.
Next, preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C). Then, spread the pistachios out on a baking tray. Toast them in the oven for 15 minutes, moving them around at least once. When done, pour them onto a separate plate or tray to cool. Make sure they are still in a single layer and not in a pile or they will not cool fast enough.
After about 10 minutes of cooling, the pistachios will be ready to candy. Continue the recipe above from there.
If you purchase raw, pre-peeled pistachios, you’ll have to roast the pistachios at home.
To do this, preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C). Then, spread the pistachios out on a baking tray. Toast them in the oven for 15 minutes, moving them around at least once. When done, pour them onto a separate plate or tray to cool. Make sure they are still in a single layer and not in a pile or they will not cool fast enough. They need to be fully cooled before you blend them into a paste.
If the pistachios were also unsalted, add 1/2 teaspoon (2.4g) of Diamond Crystal Kosher salt into the mix before blending.
Yes, the flavor and creaminess of the ganache might be slightly different, but once it’s mixed into your pistachio-white chocolate milkshake I don’t think it will be a wildly bad choice. If it’s better for you to have morsels, go for it.
For a more in-depth explanation of using chocolate bars, I typically recommend sticking to bar or higher quality chocolate if flavor and texture are important to the dish. Chocolate chips are generally made with more stabilizers and preservatives than their bar counterparts. This helps them hold their shape for things like cookies. Chocolate chips also use less cocoa butter, which makes them less smooth when melted, something that wouldn’t be the best in a ganache.
When in doubt, think about chocolate like this: regular chocolate chips < regular chocolate bar < couverture chocolate wafers < coverture chocolate bars.
Note: a couverture label can only be applied to milk and dark chocolates, since white chocolate has no cacao solids. So, white chocolate bars are as high quality as you can go. Just look for options that contain over 31% cocoa butter.
