Easy Homemade Icecream

A bowl of our easy homemade vanilla chocolate chip icecream. Photo taken quickly before it disappeared!

Trying to find things to do in the summer school holidays is often a challenge, but baking is one thing my kids are keen to help me with.

Yesterday we decided to make homemade icecream, and I have to say it was a total triumph. I had made a different recipe once before which was similar to this but went all icy when frozen. Yesterday’s effort, though, turned out lovely and creamy after a night in the freezer.

We made a simple vanilla chocolate chip version, but almost anything goes as far as flavours are concerned. My friend Diana, whose receipe this is, said the only variation she has not had success with is kiwifruit.

Easy homemade icecream

300ml cream

3/4 of a 395g tin of sweetened condensed milk

Flavour options:

4 tsps instant coffee or coffee essence

125g melted chocolate

2 or 3 scraped out vanilla pods or 1-2 tsps vanilla essence

crushed berries or other pureed fruit

(We used 1 tsp vanilla essence and 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips.)

Beat cream until thick but not buttery, adding condensed milk toward the end.

Mix in your choice of flavour. Freeze until set, preferably overnight but four hours or so can sometimes be enough.

My family all agrees this tastes better than bought icecream (and might even be cheaper)!