Chocolate-Ribboned Peppermint Ice Cream

For the chocolate sauce:
Place butter and chocolate in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Whisk together sugar and cocoa. Once butter and chocolate are melted, slowly whisk in sugar/cocoa mixture. Heat over the pan of simmering (not boiling) water for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Gradually whisk in cream until combined. Continue heating in the bowl over the simmering water for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the extracts. Pour into a container, cover, and chill in the refrigerator.

For the ice cream:
In a large bowl, whisk sugar with eggs and yolks for 1–2 minutes. Whisk in cornstarch. Set aside.

In a medium saucepan, heat 1 cup of the half-and-half over medium heat until it comes to a simmer. Slowly, whisk hot half-and-half into egg mixture. Pour entire mixture back into the pan and cook on low heat, stirring constantly for about 3–4 minutes, until thickened. The mixture will coat the back of a wooden spoon when thickened.

Pour thickened mixture through a fine strainer and into a bowl. Whisk in remaining half-and-half, cream, and extracts. Cover bowl and chill until completely cooled, up to overnight.

Before starting the ice cream process, take chocolate sauce out of the refrigerator and leave at room temperature. The sauce will be very thick but will lose some stiffness as it stands.

Pour cream into an ice cream maker and process until almost finished. With about 2 minutes remaining in the cycle, add crushed peppermints.

Spoon soft ice cream into containers, adding large dollops of chocolate sauce throughout. Press waxed paper onto the top of the containers and cover. Freeze for at least 4 hours or until scoopable.