Chocolate-Chip Coconut Ice Cream: Dairy-free, Soy-free, Gluten-free

One of Joseph’s first words was “Aiee!” which means “ice-cream.” He’s loved the coconut “non-dairy frozen desserts” and sorbets that I’ve bought. However, they are expensive, and don’t have a lot of variety in flavors. So, I’ve been excited to try my hand at making my own ice-creams. For my first attempt, I wanted something plain, because it would be the base for any future recipes. The recipe I used came from the instruction booklet for my Cuisinart ice-cream maker

The Changes

The recipe is already Joseph-safe, so I didn’t have to make any changes for allergies. I don’t have any vanilla beans, so I used vanilla extract. And because I didn’t want it to be too boring, I added in some chocolate chips.

The Method

You start by mixing all the ingredients (except chocolate chips) in a bowl. I’ve tried to save the dishes at this step by mixing everything in the bowl, but the final ice cream ended up with frozen chunks of unsweetened cream, since it froze before I’d added the sugar.

If you want the actual freezing process to go faster, you can stick the coconut milk mixture in the fridge to chill fully, but I decided to skip that step and put it directly into the ice-cream maker. It meant that it took longer to freeze, but still turned out pretty well. Also, you’ll notice that in the picture, since I added quite a bit of vanilla, the milk mixture was a bit brownish. Interestingly enough, though, the color disappeared in the freezing process.

Add the chocolate chips when the ice cream looks a bit softer than soft-serve ice cream. Let it churn for another five minutes before dishing it out.

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Chocolate-Chip Coconut Ice-Cream

Adapted from Cuisinart

Dairy-free, Soy-free, Gluten-free

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 1/3 cups sugar
• 1 Tablespoon vanilla
• pinch salt
• 2 13.5 ounce cans coconut milk
• 1/2 cup Enjoy Life chocolate chips

Whisk together water, sugar, vanilla, salt, and coconut milk until sugar is dissolved. Add to ice-cream maker according to its directions. Mix in chocolate chips in the last five minutes.

Makes 12 half-cup servings

What I Thought

This recipe almost overflowed my ice-cream maker, and had a little bit of an icy texture, rather than a creamy texture. I think because I’m not boiling water (hence reducing the amount) I can get away with reducing the amount of water in the recipe, and that can help with things. Also, I think another brand of coconut milk would have more fat in it, adding to a more creamy texture. It had a strong, sweet coconut taste to it. Joseph and his sister both gobbled it down. My husband declined to try it, in favor of REAL ice-cream.  I’ll definitely make this again.

Shared at Allergy Friendly Friday, Made From Scratch Monday, Slightly Indulgent Tuesday, Gluten-Free Wednesdays and Allergy Free Wednesday