Transcription
If you're like me and you love ice cream, but you don't want the high calories, heavy sugar, trans fats, and artificial additives that come with it, then you need to try this recipe. Today, I'm going to show you an incredibly easy, healthy, and guilt-free way to satisfy those ice cream cravings. All you need are two simple ingredients and either a blender or a food processor, and it takes just a few minutes to make. It's dairy-free, made with real natural foods, super creamy, and so delicious. And the best part is, you don't even need an ice cream maker.
The base ingredient of this recipe is simply frozen bananas. When you blend frozen bananas, you get this incredibly creamy texture with a naturally sweet flavor that very closely resembles ice cream, without all of the unhealthy and artificial parts. It makes a great base because of its natural sweetness and tastes neutral enough to use as a base with other ingredients. Today, I'll show you four of my favorite simple ice cream recipes that you can try at home yourself. And because this is basically just fruits and milk, you can enjoy it as a dessert, as a snack, or even for breakfast.
When it comes to preparing the bananas, we want to make sure that they are fully ripened, as that's when they're the sweetest. So the more brown they look on the outside, the better. One quick tip is to cut the bananas into slices before freezing so that they're easier to blend. After a few hours, they'll be ready to use. Once they've been frozen, if you find a few slices stuck to each other, just break them apart or throw them in as is. If you want something more convenient, you can also buy these bagged frozen banana slices from the grocery store, which already come pre-sliced and pre-ripened, so they're ready to use.
When it comes to blending, you can use either a simple food processor or a high-speed blender like this Vitamix blender that I'll be using today. For our base recipe, all we need are two simple ingredients: four frozen sliced bananas and 2 tablespoons of unsweetened almond milk or any other milk of your choice. Blend it on low speed until the bananas and milk break down into a creamy texture. If you're seeing that it's getting stuck while blending, you'll probably have to stop and stir it a few times to keep it moving. What you want to end up with is this smooth, creamy consistency.
When it's ready, you can scoop it out and eat it straight away. The texture will resemble this velvety soft-serve ice cream. Or, if you prefer ice cream on the harder side, you can freeze it for a couple hours before eating or store it in the freezer for up to a few weeks in a container. But keep in mind that it does get quite hard after freezing, so just make sure to leave it out at room temperature for about 20 minutes to allow it to soften up before scooping.
I like to store my ice cream in these 16 oz wide-mouth Mason jars. If you've watched some of my other videos, you'll see that I use these for everything. They hold one pint of ice cream, which is perfect for this recipe, and holds roughly the same amount as a carton of Häagen-Dazs. Their vanilla bean ice cream contains 981 calories per carton. In contrast, our homemade ice cream contains just 310 calories for roughly the same quantity. It's truly guilt-free.
This simple two-ingredient base recipe is delicious enough to be eaten on its own. I like to enhance the flavor by adding a teaspoon of vanilla extract and a splash of maple syrup or a natural sweetener like Stevia. But if you want to get even more creative, you can try adding other types of ingredients to create different flavors. Here are four of my favorite go-to recipes that are super easy to do at home.
Our first recipe is this delicious Berry Banana Ice Cream. Let's start with our base recipe of four frozen bananas and 2 tablespoons of almond milk. And to that, we're going to add 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 1 cup of frozen berries. Here, I'm using strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries, but you can use whatever you like. And lastly, 1 tablespoon of maple syrup. Blend it all together, making sure to stop and stir to get all of the ingredients blended evenly, and you should end up with this super smooth, creamy, and thick texture. Scoop it all out into a container like a mason jar, and then either enjoy it as a soft-serve ice cream or freeze it for a few hours for a hard-serve ice cream.
Our next recipe is a Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana Ice Cream. Start with our base of four frozen bananas and 2 tablespoons of almond milk. To that, we're going to add 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder, 1 teaspoon of natural peanut butter, 1 tablespoon of maple syrup, and a pinch of sea salt to bring the flavors out. Blend it all together, making sure to stop and stir to break up any chunks, and then just look at how smooth and creamy it is. Scoop it out into a mason jar and then enjoy it as a soft-serve ice cream or freeze it to enjoy as a hard-serve. This one is perfect to really satisfy those chocolate cravings in a healthy way.
Now, if you're in the mood for a more tropical twist on our banana ice cream, this one's for you. Let's combine our base of four frozen bananas and 2 tablespoons of almond milk. We're then going to add 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 1 cup of frozen pineapple and mango chunks, and 1 tablespoon of maple syrup. Blend it for a few minutes while pausing to stir, making sure to break down all the pieces of fruit until it turns into this deliciously smooth soft-serve that's ready to eat. Scoop it all into a container, and then you can enjoy it as is or freeze it for later as a hard-serve.
Lastly, if you're a coffee drinker, this coffee and ice cream is for you. Starting with our base of four frozen bananas and 2 tablespoons of almond milk, we're also going to add 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract, 1 tablespoon of maple syrup, 2 teaspoons of instant coffee powder, 1 teaspoon of cocoa powder, and a pinch of sea salt. Blend it on low speed to break down all of the ingredients, and then continue blending until it turns into a thick, creamy, and smooth texture that looks just like this. You can then scoop it all into a mason jar and then either enjoy it as a soft-serve or freeze it for a few hours to enjoy later as a hard-serve.
With these super simple recipes and just a few basic ingredients, you can have delicious, healthy, creamy ice cream ready in minutes that you can enjoy as a dessert, breakfast, or as a snack. Give these a try and let me know what you think in the comments. I'd love to hear what your favorite homemade ice cream flavors are. Until next time, thanks for watching. If you'd like to watch more, click here for another video, and if you enjoy my content, I'd really appreciate if you leave a like, comment, and subscribe to my channel. Thanks for watching.