This Valentine’s Day, I decided to make a sweet treat for my husband and I based on one of those cool recipe gifs that’s going around – namely this one: http://imgur.com/gallery/cuC8oxf.

Instead of making a boring bunch of squares, though, I decided to create some heart shapes, using a silicone mould! And, even better, I was contacted by Haagen-Dazs to see if I’d like some vouchers for their new strawberry cheesecake flavour ice-cream. It was like the heavens parted to shine the light of free ice-cream upon my head…

Here’s how you make them!

Fill your silicone moulds with the ice-cream, then freeze, preferably overnight. (If you don’t have silicone moulds, use the method in the gif and just cut the frozen ice-cream into cubes.) I used around half a tub (250ml approx) of ice-cream and made 24 little hearts, but obviously this completely depends on how big your mould is! I’d say a good portion is three of these for a cute little snack.

Once you’ve frozen them, turn them out onto greaseproof paper – if the ice-cream sticks in the mould, just use your finger to make the shapes again. Then, freeze again until solid, another few hours.

While you’re doing this, melt your chocolate. I used 200g of white chocolate, which wasn’t *quite* enough to cover the whole batch – I’d estimate 250-300g depending on how many you need to make (but for a couple, you’ll probably only need one bar!). Melt the chocolate and then add a teaspoon of olive oil to keep it glossy and runny. Allow to cool – but don’t leave it too long or it’ll go solid!

I decided to make cheesecake flavoured chocolate bites by adding some ground up digestive biscuits (graham crackers) to the top, so if you want a topping, prepare this now. I also made some with hazelnuts on the top – and why not try flaked almonds too? As in the gif, you can add all the topping to the chocolate to coat, but I prefer to sprinkle it on the top, as it preserves the shape of your ice-cream much better!

Another way to customise this is to colour your chocolate, which I did with some red food colouring to make cute pink hearts! Just add a drop or two and mix well.

Now, dip your frozen hearts into the chocolate, then place on greaseproof paper in a tray ready for the freezer. Sprinkle your topping on *right* away or it won’t stick! Repeat for the whole batch and then freeze until you’re ready to eat. You can do this well in advance, so get making now in time for Valentine’s Day on Sunday!

I used strawberries and cream flavour for this, but I really wanted to get the Haagen-Dazs strawberry cheesecake flavour to go with the digestive biscuit topping! Some other combos you could try are pralines and cream with hazelnut topping, or coffee flavoured (they’ve just brought out this flavour in the UK, my husband will be pleased!) with chocolate-coated coffee beans on the top. Or, a dark chocolate coating over Baileys? (By the way, Haagen-Dazs is on offer at the moment in loads of supermarkets – I always check My Supermarket for prices for branded products before I buy!) Check out the site for Haagen-Dazs here.

Are you planning on making anything for Valentine’s Day this year? Do let me know in the comments!