Three Ingredient Ice Cream

Before I get started here, I want to clear two things up.

First, this is not my recipe.  This recipe is all over the interwebs.  It's on Buzzfeed.  It's on hundreds of YouTube videos.  Martha Stewart uses it for goodness sake.  I won't be claiming my fame to this recipe at all, but I wanted to share it because I had never heard of this idea before so I wondered how many other people had also been hiding under a rock like me and hadn't heard of it either. And when I did see it for the first time, I was incredibly skeptical.   I am a bit of an ice cream snob, and the idea of a good ice cream made without churning it, quite frankly, seemed impossible. So I wanted to hold your hand and let you know...it's okay.  This recipe is really going to be okay in the end.

Second, yes.  I am aware it's the end of October, and pumpkin spice season is in full swing.  I should be thinking about pies and hot chocolate and tamales and all the things that warm my family's bellies when silver bells start ringing.  But...and this is a big but...it's ICE CREAM.  And it's always ice cream season.

So here's the deal: I have one of those counter top ice cream makers, and that thing has gotten some use.  I love homemade ice cream- especially banana- and so the heavy lifting for it seemed totally worth it.  But we only recently invested in a freezer that isn't the other half of our refrigerator, so we never had room to just keep the freezing bowl in the freezer...which meant some careful planning on my part.  First, I had to remember to put the bowl in the freezer a good 24 hours in advance.  Then I had to remember to make the base of the ice cream the night before I wanted to churn it.  Then I would churn it and had to let it freeze for another 8 hours so it wasn't like a thick milk shake.  If you're counting, that's ultimately a three day process.

No thanks.

Enter this recipe into my life.  No churning.  No freezing a bowl.  Very little mess, and I almost always have these three ingredients anyway.

So here's what you'll need:
2 cups of heavy whipping cream
a can of sweetened condensed milk
tsp of vanilla

If you want to get fancy and do more than just a simple vanilla, you'll need whatever you want to add in, too.

Start with pouring your whipping cream into the bowl of a stand mixer. (Or a regular bowl with a hand mixer!)  Some people refrigerate their bowl before they start, but I never do and have never had a problem.  Using a whisk attachment,  whisk the cream until soft peaks form.  Add in vanilla and sweetened condensed milk and whip until it's thick, which will only take a minute or so.  Then pour it into a freezer-safe container, freeze for at least 6 hours (but overnight is really best), and that's it.

I actually made two 8-cup containers today of this ice cream.  One I simply added banana to...so banana ice cream.  The second one, I used chocolate sweetened condensed milk to make chocolate ice cream.  Did you even know such a wonder existed??

I'm a fan.

I also have vanilla and peanut butter chocolate chunk in my freezer right now.  (I just added about 2/3 cup of peanut butter and chopped chocolate pieces to the vanilla base, and it's by far my favorite flavor so far!)

This doesn't taste like frozen whipped cream like I expected.  And it's smooth and creamy and wonderful- which I would never have believed if I hadn't tried it myself.

And these guys agree.