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Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine

June 15, 2016 by Laura 16 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

I just ate a bowl of vanilla ice cream. This hasn’t happened in over three years because my body gets mad at me now when I eat much sugar. But let me say it again: I just ate a bowl of ice cream. Happy, happy, happy, happy!!

Low Sugar Ice Cream

I’ve been wanting to figure out how to make low sugar ice cream (for three years), but I had two hang-ups:

  1. I was feeling pretty lazy about pulling out my ice cream freezer.
  2. I wasn’t confident that cutting the sugar in ice cream would taste good and I didn’t want to waste ingredients.

So I started doing some looking online. There are plenty of recipes for “no churn” ice cream so I could avoid the trouble of getting out my ice cream machine, but they all call for sweetened condensed milk. Nope. That wouldn’t make it low sugar.

Other recipes took way too many steps, at which point I figured I might as well suck it up and get out my ice cream freezer.

Finally, I decided to try the “no-churn” method I’d read about – but with healthier ingredients I feel good about instead of condensed milk – and just see what would happen. I decided if it didn’t turn out – at the very least I could re-purpose the cream mixture into a smoothie.

When you see this recipe you will wonder (like I am wondering) why it took me so much research and time to figure this out.

Three ingredients. Three. They are so obvious. (Cream, maple syrup, vanilla. See? Why did I make this so hard?)

The trick is to whip the ingredients together just long enough that they thicken, but don’t turn into whipped cream. This isn’t hard as long as you’re watching carefully. I put the ingredients into my Blendtec, whipped for 15-20 seconds, poured the mixture into a dish, froze it, and boom. I had Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream.

Low Sugar Vanilla Ice CreamYum

5.0 from 3 reviews
Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine
 
Save Print
Author: Laura
Serves: 6-8
Ingredients
  • 2 cups heavy whipping cream
  • 3 Tablespoons real maple syrup (more or less to taste)
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. Blend ingredients together with a hand mixer or in a high power blender until they have thickened - but have not yet turned into stiff whipped cream. (The mixture should still be runny.)
  2. Pour mixture into a small casserole dish.
  3. Cover and freeze for about three hours.
  4. Scoop and serve right away.
  5. If ice cream is left in the freezer overnight, you may need to let it sit on the counter a few minutes before serving!
3.4.3177

Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream

A key player in this recipe is Homemade Vanilla Extract. I decided “why just add one teaspoon when I could add two?” This, of course, makes the ice cream much, much better tasting. (Ironic, isn’t it, since I was just saying that you can use half the amount called for in recipes since this vanilla is so potent? Use less vanilla in this if you like, but I am loving the strong vanilla punch of two teaspoons in this vanilla ice cream!)

I learned that if you freeze this for less than 3 hours, the ice cream will be too liquidy. But if you freeze it for more than 3 hours it becomes a bit hard. The solution for “too hard” ice cream? Simply pull it out of the freezer and let it sit on the counter for about 10 minutes before serving. It’ll soften just enough for you to scoop it out.

low sugar icecream5low sugar icecream4

Want your ice cream to be not-so-low in sugar?

My kids agree. Simply add a little more maple syrup until you have reached your desired sweetness level. You might also try adding a few drops of liquid stevia.

Because we have the whole summer ahead of us, I will now spend time creating variations of this Low Sugar Homemade Ice Cream. I’m thinking peach, strawberry, chocolate, mint, chocolate mint, and whatever other ideas you have for me.

Go make yourself some ice cream!!

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Pictures of Last Week’s Food – and Why We Had Ice Cream Cones For Breakfast

May 10, 2015 by Laura 10 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Before we talk about ice cream for breakfast, we should probably talk about lettuce. Spoiler alert: the ice cream we ate is the same color as the lettuce, which means that one of them has food coloring in it and the other doesn’t, yet I still let my family eat both.

Hahaha, I let them eat lettuce. As if they had to beg me for it. “Please Mom can’t we just have more salad?!” said none of my children ever.

I mean, they don’t dislike salad. They just like other parts of the meal better. But whatever. They are good eaters and they eat a wide variety of fruits and veggies and so what if they ate green ice cream for breakfast last Wednesday?

So lettuce. Let-us talk about that already. (get it? lettuce=let-us. that is so amazingly funny) Look what came out of our garden last week!

food week may 92

We’ll be enjoying meal after meal of this lettuce from our garden as the rain has made our lettuce go crazy. (I won’t even tell you that none of the rest of our garden is even planted yet. Hello graduation preparation and bathroom remodel. You are cramping our gardening style.)

See what a pretty lunch we had the first day we picked lettuce? Creamy Mac and Cheese with peas and salad is the easiest lunch ever, by the way. (Can you actually call it a salad if you don’t add anything but Ranch Dressing? We were out of other salad veggies that day.)

food week may 96

Now, about that green ice cream. First the back story:

About four years ago I surprised the boys by making Homemade Ice Cream for breakfast on our very last day of school. The following year, they declared that we had always had ice cream on the last day of school and that it was a tradition and that we simply must do it again. I believe they told me this at bedtime the night before our last day of school, which of course meant that while I loved the idea, I did not love the idea making homemade ice cream at midnight or 6:00 am. So I told them no, and then I decided on a splurge of all splurges and surprised them the next morning with not only store-bought ice cream – but a box of ice cream cones too.

(The “Best Mom Ever” Award went to me that day. But then I made them do their living room and bathroom chores so I immediately went back to “Best Mom Ever” status after breakfast.)

Anyway, the Last Day of School Ice Cream tradition has continued (which I only do because we home school because it would truly be wrong of me to feed my kids sugar cones filled with drippy sugar and then send them to be instructed by other adults). The three younger boys finished their school work last Friday, but patiently waited for Asa to finish his last college final on Tuesday (he’s been getting dual credits for high school/college this year – woot!) so that we could celebrate by having ice cream for breakfast.

food week may 9 5

food week may 94

It was grand. But now we should probably talk about vegetables again.

I hit some great price matching deals on berries this week. 99¢ for blackberries? Yes, please. Plus I got great prices on strawberries and raspberries. We’ve been eating these delicious fruits with just about every meal, so these are already almost gone. (We put the food away at our house, I’m telling you.)

food week may 93

Don’t ask me why I bought mixed greens this week. Hello, Laura. Your garden is kicking out lettuce right now, remember??

Have any of you ever tried that Hormel Natural Choice Bacon? I was excited to see it at the store since it is a “better for you” brand. It was quite tasty!

Friday night I experimented with another new recipe we all loved: Sloppy Salsa Chicken. Don’t tell, but I’m almost finished with a project I’ve been working on for several months in an effort to simplify our (yours and mine!) evening meal time. Later this week, I plan to reveal some packets I’ve been putting together which include recipes, complete grocery lists, and instructions for creating five meals that can be made ahead all at once, then frozen for fast real-food meals for your family. Details coming!!

sloppy salsa chicken 1

Here’s a little sneak peek at one of the packet cover pages:

Eat Right Away Beef Edition 50

There’s also a Chicken Edition, and then I’ll be working on several additional editions (I couldn’t resist) for the future like breakfast, lunch box, ground turkey, and others!

So back to last week’s food details. It was a Bountiful Basket week for me, and I almost bought the whole truck. Man, we get some good deals from BB!

food week may 91

Along with all you see here, I also got a huge box of sweet corn. Which leads me to Mother’s Day.

I wanted grilled burgers with watermelon and sweet corn. So that is what my men made me. As you can see, I worked on my corn and melon before my burger. Ooh, and Matt put some fresh asparagus from our garden on the grill too. So yum.

food week may 99

After we digested, we played our traditional game of three-on-three Mother’s Day soccer. I so stink at soccer. But it sure was fun.

One final bit about last week…

Some sweet friends gave me a basket full of thank-you gifts and look what was included!

food week may 98

Yes, it is a coffee mug that is almost as big as my head. Almost. As you see here, I filled it just about to the top. This meant that after I finished drinking it on Saturday morning, I absolutely did conquer the world and solve all of earth’s biggest challenges (it’s a caffeine miracle).

So there you have it. Berries, vegetables, ice cream, and a huge mug of coffee. That about sums up last week for me. (I also did laundry and cleaned, but who wants the boring details on that? No one.)

Tell me about your week in food! Find great deals? Make yummy meals? Drink giant-sized mugs of coffee? Splurge on ice cream? Share, share, share!!!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Snowman Pancakes

January 2, 2011 by Laura 7 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

We haven’t yet had a big, hard snow fall in Nebraska. I’m sure it’s coming sometime. The boys are really looking forward to some Snow Ice Cream. It is SO worth the uncontrollable shivering and blue lips to eat Snow Ice Cream.

While we eagerly (sort of) await some snow…we’re having fun making some (warm) snow related food. 

See, check out our cute Snowmen Pancakes:

I just used my regular Simple Soaked Pancake recipe with these mini soy free chocolate chips I order from Amazon. Sometimes our snowmen receive randomly placed buttons and eyeballs when we accidentally drop a chocolate chip in the wrong spot. You’ve gotta love a snowman with freckles.

We also had a lot of fun last week making Snowflake Quesadillas:

meltingsnowflakes6sm1.JPG

And…I thought I’d share this idea sent to me last year. One reader, Jenny, used my whole wheat soft pretzel recipe to make Pretzel Snowmen. Too cute to eat…almost.

pretzelsnowman

I wonder when my kids will outgrow “cute food”. Eh, as long as it’s FOOD, they’ll keep humoring me, right?

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Vanilla Stickers

June 30, 2010 by Laura 22 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Lookie what came in the mail!!

I ordered some pretty stickers to put on my homemade vanilla extract bottles from Delight Design and I LOVE them!! Aren’t they pretty?!

vanilla

Be sure to check out Delight Design if you are in the process of making vanilla!

I, also, love these pretty labels that my friend makes! They are customizable, and come in several fun designs!

And now…I’m totally hungry for homemade vanilla ice cream. ;)

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Gratituesday: A Great Visit

April 26, 2010 by Laura 18 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

gratituesdaynov09

I mentioned in this post that I don’t usually do much with facebook. But…when it comes to reuniting friendships…I think facebook is so awesome!

God had just put my friend Melody on my heart…and I thought, “Hmm, I should look her up on facebook to see if she has a page.” The VERY next day, I received a friend request from Melody!! Don’t you love how God works!?

We started chatting and the long and the short of it was:  I needed to see her! I needed to hug her neck! I wanted to catch up face to face!

Melody found some amazingly priced plane tickets and just a few short weeks after we “found each other” again, she and her two sweet babies are here for a visit!

We’ve had a wonderful time. Ooh, but did I mention that I have laryngitis and Melody has plugged ears? It’s made for some interesting conversation times, that’s for sure. :) 

I’ve loved meeting her kids (ages 2 and 3). I’ve loved being able to catch up on what all has been going on with her since we last saw each other several years ago. (She happened to be hanging out at my house the night my water broke when I was pregnant with Justus. Yeah, we go way back!)

Today was Melody’s birthday, so of course there was lots of celebration food! 

melody1sm
She requested biscuits and gravy for breakfast. My family cheered.

melody2sm
My boys were being awfully quiet after breakfast (always reason for concern). Turns out, they were upstairs with the door closed working on a special birthday song for Melody. It was oh so goofy…and oh so sweet. (Yes, mostly it was goofy.)

melody4
We “picnicked” inside during lunchtime since the weather turned out nasty, and of course we had pretzels.

melody5sm
We served up some yummy cake and homemade ice cream after lunch. Don’t you love all the pictures of a sweet little girl in pink ruffles and pig tails? You don’t see many of those kind of pictures around here, do you?

I’ve loved our visit…and I’m so thankful for how God orchestrated all the details to make it possible. God is so good.

What are you thankful for this Gratituesday? Write about it on your blog, then come link up with us here. If you don’t have a blog, be sure to leave a comment letting us know what you’re grateful for!

If you are linking up a blog post for Gratituesday,
please copy and paste the following sentence into your post! Thanks!


Join us for Gratituesday at Heavenly Homemakers!

(P.S. You’ll want to be sure and check out the Spring Cleaning Carnival at Katie’s and Lenetta’s today!)

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Which Ice Cream Maker?

April 7, 2010 by Laura 22 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Since posting about The Ice Cream Experiment, I’ve had all kinds of comments and emails asking which Ice Cream Maker I would recommend. Thought I’d pop on real quickly and tell you about my favorite!

A couple of years ago when Matt and I were dabbling in the Shaved Ice and Homemade Ice Cream business, a friend told us that the BEST ice cream maker was the White Mountain Electric Ice Cream Maker.

white_mountain_ice_cream_maker

We weren’t sure at first, mostly because the White Mountain Electric Ice Cream Maker is quite pricey compared to others we’d looked at (you know, like at Wal-mart).

But after checking into the White Mountain Electric Ice Cream Maker and seeing what a high quality machine it was, we decided to order it. Almost two years later, we couldn’t be more pleased with our purchase. This ice cream maker is like none other we’d ever used. We’d already gone through three cheap ice cream makers (the $25 makers you can get at the store). But our White Mountain? This baby is made to last, making it well worth the investment.

Our favorite part is that the can that you use to make the ice cream in is made of stainless steel. All others we’ve had were made of aluminum (which we now avoid, especially for dairy products). And…the motor/gear piece that turns the ice cream? It’s made of cast iron.

Yeah, the White Mountain is one heavy contraption. Did I mention the big tub is made of pine? It’s awesome.

The White Mountain people aren’t paying me to tell you all of this. I just love their product. Our ice cream is usually finished churning and ready to eat in about 25 minutes.

And now seriously, I am SO hungry for ice cream. I have GOT to get my hands on some cream.

I’d love for you all to let us know what your favorite ice cream maker is! Any great recommendations for us?

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

The Ice Cream Experiment: Take One

March 30, 2010 by Laura 105 Comments

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Is all ice cream created equal? Should we go with the cheap stuff…or is it worth it to pay a little more to make our own or buy brands that have more wholesome ingredients?

I recently read an ice cream story that left me with my jaw on the ground. With Randy’s permission, I will share part of his story (taken from a monthly newsletter I receive from North Star Neighbors)…

On February 25th, I went to [a grocery store] and purchased  2-quarts of ice cream. It tasted so-so. I went to try again and when opening the cartons, it just didn’t look right and fresh! So, I set both cartons in the sink to melt.
 
The [first brand] took 2 days to actually melt. The [second brand] NEVER did melt. Three days after sitting on the counter, I stuck a spoon in it and it ‘stood up’ all by itself. 

I read through the rest of this email and was shocked that an entire month later, the second brand of ice cream had still not melted!!!! Ice cream that doesn’t melt?! Whoa! I knew that many store brand ice creams contain some funky ingredients, which is why I avoid them, but funky ingredients that actually keep the ice cream from melting?! Kinda makes you think that maybe this frozen stuff in a box is possibly…not real food?!?!

And so, I decided to do a little ice cream experiment of my own, and blog the progress for you. Only for you (and because I’m weird enough to want to see this for myself) would I buy two cartons of ice cream that I wasn’t planning to eat  and leave it on my countertop for days and days to watch it’s progress.

At the risk of sounding like Dr. Seuss, please allow me to introduce to you…Brand One and Brand Two:

icecreamex1sm

Brand One Ingredients:  milk, cream, sugar, skim milk, corn syrup, whey protein concentrate, mono- and diglycerides, guar gum, sodium phosphate, cellulose gum, sodium citrate, polysorbate 80, carrageenan, vanilla extract, artificial flavor, annatto

Brand Two Ingredients:  milk, cream, buttermilk, whey, high fructose corn syrup, sugar, guar gum, mono & diglycerides, sodium phosphate, cellulose gum, sodium citrate, polysorbate 80, carrageenan, natural flavor, annatto

We took a scoop out of each, just to show the texture.

Brand One:

icecreamexsm

Take special notice of the layer of gunk (for lack of a better word) on the top of the box of Brand Two:

icecreamex3sm

We set the ice cream out at precisely 10:40 am Saturday, March 27 (2010).

Exactly one hour later, Brand One looked like this:

icecreamex4sm

And Brand Two looked like this:

icecreamex5sm

They appear to be melting don’t they? Oh dear, maybe we should stop the experiment right now and eat the ice cream before it melts all over the place! But no, let’s not. Let’s wait and see what happens.

Two hours later…Brand One:

icecreamex7sm

Brand Two (notice again, the lid gunk that hasn’t changed a bit):

icecreamex8sm

As the familiar saying goes, a watched ice cream carton never melts…so we put a towel under it and walked away for the evening. 

The next morning…

Brand One:

icecreamex9sm

Brand Two:

icecreamex10sm

The towel underneath the cartons was wet and clearly the cartons were slightly less full than when we first started this two days ago. So, I will give it this much:  the ice cream was melting somewhat.

Moving on to Monday morning…

Brand One:

icecreamex12sm

Brand Two:

icecreamex11sm

At this point in the experiment, it had been almost 48 hours since we’d taken the ice cream out of the freezer. When we gently pushed on the contents of the cartons, it resembled a sponge. A sticky sponge.

What could we do now, but make Homemade Ice Cream with all natural ingredients to make a comparison! And so, we lugged out our ice cream maker and got it whirling.

Homemade Ice Cream Ingredients:  Cream, milk, real maple syrup, egg yolks, vanilla, arrowroot powder

icecreamex13sm

Okay…yum.

I know this experiment isn’t exactly apples to apples (or ice cream to ice cream as the case may be) because I just wasn’t willing to part with an entire quart of homemade ice cream to see how long it would take to melt. Instead, we scooped some out into a small bowl.

Here’s the Homemade Ice Cream at 11:40 Monday morning:

icecreamex14sm

Homemade Ice Cream at one hour later at 12:40 pm:

icecreamex.15sm

And the homemade ice cream on Monday at 1:26 pm:

icecreamex16sm

The homemade ice cream melted in our mouths too…but that goes without saying.

So let’s review:

Homemade Ice Cream…melted in just under two hours.

Brand One and Brand Two…72 hours later, we’re still waiting to find out.

Check back  here in a few days and I’ll share the ice cream melting progress (or lack thereof)!

And um, just in case it never melts…how long do you suppose I should let it sit on my countertop?
——————————————

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