Chocolate Honeycomb Ice Cream Bears - Made With 3D Printed Moulds

What's better than ice cream bars? Ice cream bears!

We know that bears love honey, so what better flavour than honeycomb for a chocolate covered ice cream bear?

These ice cream bears are filled with honeycomb milk ice cream and covered in honeycomb and milk chocolate with honeycomb white chocolate details.

I didn't have an ice cream bar mould and wanted a specific shape, so I decided to 3d print a mould and cutters for the details. I created the mould and cutters with Adobe Illustrator and Tinkercad.

I've included the stl files for the cutters and moulds, so you could skip over the steps where the files are created and just use the files to print the cutters and mould. You could also use store bought ice cream and honeycomb.

I really enjoyed making these ice cream bears. I hope you enjoy the Instructable. It's my first one, so bear with me.

Supplies

For the moulds:

A 3d printer

Pla Filament

Cling Wrap

Popsicle sticks

For the Honeycomb: I used about a quater of the honeycomb, so you could half the recipe.

200g Sugar

75g Golden syrup (You could substitute glucose syrup or corn syrup.)

32g Honey

35g Water

9g Bicarbonate of soda

For the Ice Cream Base: Makes about 500ml

2 cups (500ml) Full Cream Milk

1/8 cup (30ml) Sugar

1/8 teaspoon Salt

1/2 cup (125ml) Skim Milk Powder

For the chocolate coating and details:

80g white chocolate

240g milk chocolate

55g coconut oil

tools:

Candy thermometer

A container for dipping the ice cream in the chocolate (I used a glass)

Skewers

Baking paper (Parchment paper)

Small offset spatula

Whisk

Medium sized pot

Spatula

Spoons

Knives

Bowls

Cutting Board

Strainer

Pastry brush

Step 1: Create the Mould and Cutters.

1. Draw the bear in Illustrator and export png files for use in Tinkercad.

I've attached the exported png files as well as a pdf of the Adobe Illustrator file. The pdf can be opened and edited in Illustrator or another vector graphics application.

Draw the bear using simple shapes.
I realised that I could use the snout for the ears, so I ended up with 4 shapes for cutters - the body, the snout, an eye and the bears stomach. I also created a fill of the bear's body to use as the base of the mould.
Make the fill of the shapes clear and the stroke 0.5mm
Outline the strokes (object-path-outline strokes)
Remove the inside part of the second body shape to create the fill.
Export the shapes as png files by selecting each shape individually and then going to file-export selection.

Step 2: Create the Cutters and Mould in Tinkercad

Import the svg files into Tinkercad one by one by clicking on import and selecting the svg file from your computer or dragging it into the box.
Select "Art"
Make sure the width and height of each shape is correct by selecting the shape in illustrator and checking the width and height.
By default the shapes are imported extruded with a height of 10mm. Leave the cutters (body, tummy, snout/ear and eye) like this.
Duplicate the body cutter and change the height to 20mm. This is for the sides of the mould.
Change the height of the base (filled shape) to 1mm.
Centre the base and the 20mm body cutter with one another.
Group the Base and 20mm body cutter to create one solid shape. This is the ice cream bear mould.
Create a box with width 10mm (width of my popsicle stick) and height 10.1mm (half of the heigt of the mould + half the thickness of the popsicle stick) and set it to be a hole. Align the box with the center and top of the mould object, so that it creates a hole for the popsicle stick (see image).
Group the box and the mould object.
Export each of the objects as an stl file by selecting the object, clicking export and selecting stl.

Step 3: 3d Print the Cutters and Mould

Originally I printed more parts of the bear, so that's what's shown in the photos. The prints came out a bit stringy, but I cleaned them up with a few light strokes of a kitchen blow torch.

I printed them in clear PLA to get as close to food safe as I could.

I printed them with a 5mm brim and a layer height of 0.2mm.

I've attached the stl files.

Step 4: Make the Honeycomb

Ingrediënts:

200g sugar

75g Golden Syrup. You could substitute glucose syrup or corn syrup.

32g Honey

35g Water

9g Bicarbonate of Soda

Method:

Line a 20cm heat proof tin or casserole dish with baking paper.
Combine the sugar, golden syrup, honey and water in a medium sized pot.
Heat on a low heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Do not stir after this, but swirl the pot if necessary and brush sides of pot with water if sugar crystals form.
Cook until the mixture reaches 160C.
Add the bicarb and whisk quickly to dissolve the bicarb. The mixture will bubble up.
Pour the bubbling mixture into the lined dish and leave to cool.
Once it's cool, remove the honeycomb from the dish and break it into large pieces.
Finely chop or crush about a quarter of the honeycomb.
Store the the honeycomb in an airtight container until needed.

Step 5: Make the Ice Cream

Ingrediënts:

2 cups (500ml) Full Cream Milk

1/8 cup (30ml) Sugar

1/4 cup (60ml) Finely Crushed Honeycomb

1/8 teaspoon Salt

1/2 cup (125ml) Skim Milk Powder

another 1/4 cup (60ml) chopped Honeycomb for mixing in once the ice cream is frozen.

Method:

Combine the milk, sugar, finely crushed honeycomb, salt and skim milk powder.
Whisk until the milk powder, sugar and honeycomb is dissolved. If there are lumps you can strain the mixture.
Churn in an Ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.
Remove Ice cream from the ice cream maker and add the a 1/4 cup of chopped honeycomb.
Place the ice cream in the freezer until you're ready to fill the moulds.

Step 6: Fill the Moulds

Place Cling wrap over the mould. This is both to make the release easier and to make sure that the mould will be food safe for multiple uses.
Scoop Ice cream into the mould, making sure to press the ice cream and the cling wrap down into the corners of the mould.
Place the popsicle stick on top of the ice cream to see how far it should be pushed in.
Push the popsicle stick in from the side. The partly frozen ice cream should hold it in place, but make sure it's level.
Smooth the top of the ice cream with a small offset spatula or the back of a knife.
Place the ice cream bars in the freezer until they are completely frozen.

Step 7: Melt the Chocolate and Coconut Oil

Melt 240g milk chocolate in the microwave, 5 to 10 seconds at a time, stirring in between. Don't put it in the microwave for longer at a time as chocolate burns very easily.
When there are a few pieces left, stir the chocolate until all the chocolate has melted.
Add 40g coconut oil to the chocolate and stir until everything is melted and mixed well.
Follow the same process with the white chocolate, melting 80g of chocolate and adding 15g of coconut oil.
If the chocolate becomes too hard at any point you can put it back in the microwave for 5 to 10 seconds at a time, stirring in between, until it's melted.

Step 8: White Chocolate Bear Parts

Put about 4 tablespoons of white chocolate into a small bowl. If you run out, mix another batch of 4 to 1.
Add about a tablespoon of crushed honeycomb and mix well.
Pour some of the chocolate honeycomb mixture onto baking paper, spread it out with a spoon or a small offset spatula and let it cool until it's set, but not hard.
Use the tummy cutter and eye cutter to cut a tummy and two eyes for every bear you plan to make. The snouts are cut out in the photo, but I ended up melting them and making the snout like in step 5.
Spread some more of the chocolate mixture onto baking paper and , while it's melted, use a skewer dipped in milk chocolate to draw a nose and mouth for every snout you plan to cut out. Start with a little blob for the noes. Use the snout cutter as a guide for size.
When the chocolate has set, cut out a snout for every bear you plan to make.
Any offcuts can be melted again.

I made enough parts for four bears and tasted here and there. I used a bit less than half of the white chocolate, so I think you should be able to get at least 10 bears' parts out of the 80g chocolate. Maybe more if you taste less along the way.

Step 9: Mixing the Milk Chocolate and Honeycomb

Mix the milk chocolate with honeycomb using the same ratio of chocolate to honeycomb (4 tablespoons chocolate to 1 tablespoon honeycomb) in a microwaveable container that's a bit taller and a bit wider than the ice cream bear. I used a 200ml drinking glass. I used about 3/4 cup of chocolate (12 tablespoons), so I added 3 tablespoons of crushed honeycomb. The amount you mix will depend on the size of your container. It needs to be deep enough to completely cover the ice cream.

Step 10: Making the Ears

Spread some of the chocolate honeycomb mixture on a piece of baking paper and when it's set, but not quite hard cut out the ears using the ear/snout cutter. The ears should be about 2/3mm thick. If the chocolate layer is to thin, let it set for a while and then add some more chocolate before you cut out the ears. I made the ears in the photos with chocolate without honeycomb, but I think the ears should have honeycomb too.
Put the ears on baking paper and place them in the freezer until needed. They need to be hard enough to press into the ice cream.

Step 11: Dipping the Ice Cream Bear

Make sure the container of milk chocolate is melted.
Remove one of the ice cream bears from the freezer at a time (the ice cream melts quite fast).
Lift the cling wrap and ice cream out of the mould. I used an offset spatula between the cling wrap and the mould to loosen the sides.
Dip the ice cream in the container of milk chocolate and honeycomb, making sure to cover a bit of the popsicle stick.
Lift the ice cream and let it drip for a few seconds.
Immediately press the ears into the head. This has to be done before the chocolate sets, which can be quite fast.

Step 12: Adding the Bears Face and Tummy

Use some of the plain milk chocolate coconut oil mixture to attach the bears snout and eyes. Put some on the part that you're attaching and gently press it onto the ice cream bear.

You'll probably have to melt the chocolate again by this time. If you do, put the bear back in the freezer while you melt the chocolate.

Finally use a skewer and some of the plain milk chocolate to make a dot in each of the bear's eyes.

Put the bear back in the freezer and start on the next bear. You could of course get all the bears up to the point where they have ears, put them back in the freezer and then attach all the bears' tummies and faces.

Put the bears back in the freezer for a couple of hours to make sure the ice cream is frozen and then enjoy your ice cream bears!