Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream

I love children. And I love ice cream. So, when my sweet niece – well, I’ve adopted her as my niece since my siblings only produce boys – had a Strawberry Shortcake birthday party, who was I to deny ~~myself~~ her some strawberry ice cream?

I’ve made ice cream before, once, and it was vegan and made without an ice cream maker. We were so hungry we didn’t even wait for it to freeze up all the way. After reading a few blogs on the differences in the process of making it with & without a machine, it just saves a lot of labor time with it. So for this special event I actually bought a cheapie ice cream maker and was not disappointed. If you don’t have an ice cream maker, no need to fear, because I’ll guide you through it.

It’s super yummy, creamy, and was a huge hit at the birthday party for children & adults alike. Not gonna lie, this isn’t the healthiest version of ice cream you’ll find, but I at lease reduced the amount of sugar so the faint sweetness doesn’t knock you into sugar-coma. Now that I’ve conquered this and know how easy it is, I’ll experiment with other healthy but still tasty alternatives.

Strawberry Ice Cream Recipe
Adapted from chefinyou.com
makes 5 quarts

2 lbs ripe strawberries

4 C cream

2 C milk

1.5 C sugar, divided

1 T vanilla

1 t salt

Wash and dry the berries, cut off the tops and any funny white or green spots. You want ripe, sweet berries for the best flavor. 1 pound of berries I cut in half and set aside to purée them. The other half was roughly chopped to be bits in the ice cream. If the ice cream won’t be eaten within a day or so, I would purée all the berries. If left in the freezer for an extended time they become rock hard and acquire a funny flavor.

After the berries are cut & in their respective bowls, sprinkle a 1/4 cup of sugar in each bowl and let them sit for at least 10 minutes. When my mom did this when I was little, the sugar drew out the juices of the strawberries making a syrup, but since I used vegan cane sugar this actually didn’t happen the way I thought it would. If you use regular sugar, you’ll get the syrupy results, if not, you’ll at least sweeten the berries a little bit and that will still help.

In a large bowl whisk together the milk,

the remaining cup of sugar, salt,

and vanilla.

Slowly whisk in the cream last – you don’t want to make whipped cream.

Once everything is fully incorporated, purée the berries.

Add the purée to the rest of the ingredients and slowly add in all the berries – purée & pieces.

Chill for at least 1 hour in the fridge. After its chilled, make the ice cream according to your makers instructions. With such a great quantity, the ice cream maker should churn for at least 45 minutes. If it were a smaller portion, 20-30 minutes should suffice.

If you do not have an ice cream maker, skip the fridge step and put the cream mixture in a sealed container in the freezer. Remove every hour for 4-6 hours and mix with an electric mixer to break up the ice cream. This is the hand version of what the ice cream maker is churning.

This is how mine turned out after 45 minutes of churning.

It turned out pretty soft even after 45 minutes. If you like soft serve style, though, it’s great just like this!

However, I knew this wouldn’t work with 3-year-olds, so I divided the ice cream into several plastic containers and froze the mixture for 4 hours. It was perfect at the party!!!