We pooled our Amazon tokens in Christmas 2011 and bought an ice cream maker, and we’ve had great fun with it ever since. One of the things we got to thinking about was how we could use it to make savoury ice cream, basically a frozen starter. This is the result, a recipe we invented from scratch, a surprisingly lush, yet sophisticatedly flavoursome dish that ticks all sorts of boxes, not least the one that says ‘Carbonara as you’ve never tasted it’. It makes enough for 8 people, as that’s the minimum our ice cream maker will do, but of course you can just serve half of it for four diners and keep the rest in the freezer. This dish goes very well, by the way, with Almond and Fake Chorizo Biscuits Also, there's a great by-product with this lovely dish; the chorizo oil dressing is superb with salads, pasta dishes, etc etc.

30g very finely grated parmesan cheese

500mls semi-skimmed milk

3 egg yolks

200mls double cream

Salt and freshly ground green or black pepper

64 mange tout

Wasabe paste

For the dressing:

20g very finely diced mild cooking chorizo/fake bacon

2 - 3 tbsp ground nut oil

1 pinch salt

1 pinch English mustard powder

1½ tsp runny honey

Juice of half a lemon

• Put half the parmesan in a bowl and add 150mls of the milk. Leave to soak for an hour

• Gently fry the diced chorizo in 2 tablespoons groundnut oil for a minute. Remove from heat, drain the chorizo, keeping the oil, set aside the chorizo, and keep warm. You should have about 75ml of chorizo oil – this depends on the fat content of the chorizo. If it is less than 75ml top up with groundnut oil. Then add the salt, mustard powder, honey and lemon juice. Whisk together and check the balance of flavours. It should be sweet-sour with the smoky paprika flavour being balanced by the honey. Set aside

• Once the cheese has been soaking for an hour, bring the remaining milk to a gentle boil in a small saucepan, and add the soaked parmesan and milk. Simmer for 2 minutes, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon to keep the cheese from sticking. Put a fine sieve over a glass bowl, and pour the cheesey milk into it. Gently stir it with the wooden spoon so all the milk passes through, and you’re left with a sticky lump of cheese solids. Discard this, all the cheese flavour is now in the milk

• Whisk the egg yolks in another bowl until they’re starting to froth up and going light yellow

• Put the cheesey milk back in the pan and bring it back to a very gentle bubble. Take a tablespoon full out of it, and very slowly dribble it into the eggs, whisking all the while, repeat with another tablespoon full. Then pour the egg and cheesey milk mix slowly back into the gently simmering milk, continually stirring with a wooden spoon. Simmer the mixture on a low heat, stirring all the while, till it starts to thicken, and coats the back of the spoon; this should take 4 to 5 minutes. Do not allow to boil, or it’ll curdle

• Take the mixture off the heat, pour it into a clean glass litre sized measuring jug and allow to cool for half an hour

• After half an hour, beat the double cream till it’s starting to stiffen, but is still quite floppy. Stir it gently into the cheesey mixture in the measuring jug. Stir in a half to one teaspoon of salt, depending on your taste, and a teaspoon of freshly ground pepper

• Turn your ice cream maker on, and set it for 50 minutes. After a couple of minutes, start pouring the mixture in

• With 5 minutes to go, slowly add the other half of the grated Parmesan

• At the end, turn the ice cream out into freezer containers, and put in the freezer

• When you’re 10 minutes off serving, take the ice cream out of the freezer to allow it to soften a little. Steam your mange tout till only just done, then refresh them under cold water. Put two small scoops of ice cream, and eight mange tout on each plate. Put a blob of wasabe paste on the side of each plate. Dribble a teaspoonful of chorizo dressing over the ice cream, and sprinkle with the chorizo crumbs. Serve