Now, I know I’ve been gone for a
while—so sorry—but you are going to forgive me when I lay this one on you. You see, here in the fiery furnace we stay
inside and teach/chase/wrestle three SUPER energetic kids under the age of
seven all the while wishing we could step outside without incinerating. Slight hyperbole, but I promise only
slight. So, we spend a good deal of time
trying to make being inside FUN, special, not wanting to climb the walls
(literally). One way we devised to cope
with being cooped up is to have yummy cooking projects—especially cold
ones. Now, I’m not knocking my beloved
Lulu’s (where at last we have decent ice cream), but we have found a reason to
make our trips to the ice cream case waaaayyy less frequent.
I know you’re dying to hear this
recipe, but first let me tell you two things that make it so perfect:
1.
You do not use an Ice Cream maker!
2.
This base can be made into any
flavor you want…let me elucidate
Eldest daughter has a really nicely
developed palate, she enjoys more grown-up foods like green olives and caramelized
onion quiche, whereas eldest son would happily subsist on PBJ and yogurt and
Imp picks at everything a little. That
being said, her favorite ice cream for a while has been Breyer’s Grasshopper
pie (it’s mint chocolate chip with Oreo cookies together), and definitely not
something we’ll find around here—until now.
Because I wanted her to have that ice cream, oh ok and I wanted to have
some too—we searched and we tweaked and now we reveal…
THE BEST, EASIEST HOMEADE ICE CREAM
(BASE) EVER!!!!!!
You will need a blender, a glass
dish that can fit in your freezer (8x8 works fine, round deep dish pie dish
works too), a spatula, and some sense of adventure
Ice cream base:
3 egg yolks (now don’t freak out—many “high-end” (Ben and Jerry’s, I’m
talking about you) companies use raw egg yolks). But if it makes you feel better you can
temper the yolks over a double boiler until nice and warm with the next
ingredient
14 oz. sweetened condensed milk
2 cups heavy cream (I eyeball it)
4 tsp vanilla (eyeball it again)
Put it in your blender and blend
away until nice and incorporated and the cream is bubbly a little. I’ve seen variations of this recipe where you
whip the cream and then fold it together, but trust me this way is faster and
results in less dishes—a win-win all-around!
Now pour this in your dish, cover
it and place in the freezer for about 6 hrs or so. I stir mine every hour the first two or three
hours and then leave it.
The really fun part is how you
dress this base up.
Grasshopper pie: Crush 12 or so Oreos and break up a couple chunks of a good mint
chocolate bar and stir them in before placing ice cream in the freezer
Dark chocolate with peanut butter
swirl—eat your heart out Baskin Robbins!:
add 1/3 C. dark cocoa before blending and then, after two or three hours,
stir in swirls of creamy peanut butter (about ½ C. or whatever floats your boat). I just ate this one, and trust me it was so
good I licked the bowl, several times.
I literally just discovered this magical recipe so
I haven’t gotten farther than these two flavors, but I’ve got a million more
swirling in my brain just waiting to try…maybe peaches next or cherry…you’re
only limited by your imagination (and in my case my waistline). Happy summer to you!
