Ice cream Recipes using almond milk

Ice cream is one of the most well-loved and well-known desserts in the world because it is sweet and creamy, cold and refreshing, and can be really tasty and milky. It’s perfect as a dessert, a snack, or an add-on to other foods like pies, cookies, brownies, milkshakes, etc. It consists mostly of milk and cream, which can be high in fat unless dairy alternatives are used like in almond milk ice cream. This type of ice cream tastes as good as the one made from dairy milk, but it can be healthier and taste even yummier especially if you have your own almond milk ice cream recipe! Homemade almond milk ice cream is fairly easy to do, so you can have your healthy dessert fix any time!

Almond milk

You first have to make your own almond milk before making the ice cream (that is if you prefer making it to buying pre-packaged almond milk). Soak at least one cup of almonds overnight or longer, maybe up to 2 days. After all, the longer the almonds are soaked, the creamier your almond milk will be. Rinse the soaked almonds and combine them with two cups of water in a blender or a food processor, and turn it on at top speed for around 2-4 minutes or until the resulting liquid turns milky white and the almonds have been reduced to a very fine meal. Separate the liquid from this meal by pouring the mixture into a bowl lined with a cheese cloth or nut milk bag. Gently squeeze the cloth or bag to get all the liquid. You now have about two cups of almond milk! If you want more flavour, you can add a sweetener or flavourings like vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, etc. You can also use the remaining almond meal in your almond milk ice cream!

Almond milk ice cream ingredients and equipment

And now for the main event, making your own almond milk ice cream! For this almond milk ice cream recipe, let us use chocolate since it is one of the most popular and most classic ice cream flavours.

1 ½ cups of almond milk

2 ripe bananas

2 tablespoons of chocolate cocoa

2 tablespoons of sugar (or sweetener of your choice)

For your equipment, you’ll need the following:

1 microwavable bowl or cup

A microwave

A blender (or food processor)

An ice cream maker

And of course, you need to have a fridge!

What to do

First, whisk half a cup of almond milk together with the chocolate cocoa and sugar in the microwavable bowl or cup until they are mixed well. Microwave the mixture for 40 seconds and stir well.

In your blender or food processor, put in the bananas, the remaining cup of almond milk, and the cocoa mixture. Blend them for about 10 seconds or until pureed. Process the puree in the ice cream maker for about 20 minutes or until the mixture is thick enough. If you do not have an ice cream maker, you don’t have to worry about spending on one right away. You can just use a rectangular baking dish to pour the puree in. Place it in the freezer and leave it there for around 45 minutes. With a fork, stop the formation of more ice crystals around the edges of the dish by scraping them up. Put the dish back into the freezer and leave it there for another 30 minutes or so and scrape again. Repeat the process of freezing and scraping until the mixture becomes totally frozen.

You can now serve the ice cream right away or freeze it more for later consumption or if you want it to be firmer. Making almond milk ice cream can be done in less than an hour (with an ice cream maker) and this recipe yields four servings.

Other varieties

If you’re not really a chocolate lover, you can still make other variations of this healthy ice cream alternative. You can have an all-almond (has almond milk, almond butter, and chopped almonds or the almond meal residue from making almond milk) ice cream or maybe some strawberry almond milk ice cream. You can also go for another classic flavour, vanilla or add a little bit of spice with cinnamon. If you just want a hint of chocolate, make the ice cream without any cocoa and just add chocolate syrup when you serve it.