HOMEMADE STRAWBERRY ICE CREAM

Want an idea for last-minute and fun entertaining, something that is sure to please everyone’s palate—especially during the warm, summer months? Make some homemade ice cream!

Now you if you have kids—with lots of excess energy to burn up—the good old-fashioned hand-crank ice cream maker might be the right one for you. But my personal preference is the 1 ½ and 2-quart automatic ice cream makers. I have had several brands, but my favorite by far is the automatic frozen yogurt and ice cream makers that Cuisinart makes. It’s so easy to make ice cream with these. You just mix up the ingredients and pour it into in the freezer bowl (which has been in the freezer for at least 24-hours) and turn on the machine. After 25-30 minutes, you have ice cream!


I have two freezer bowls. Each makes about 1 ½ quarts of delicious homemade ice cream. During the summer months, I have at least one freezer bowl in the freezer—ready to go and ready for last-minute entertaining opportunities—at all times. What I like about this ice cream maker (besides the fact that it’s automatic!) is the size; the freezer bowls are just the right size so that you don’t make too much of any one flavor. So with two different freezer bowls, I might use the first one to make cookies and cream or strawberry ice cream, and the other for mocha almond fudge or buttered pecan. That way, I can make plenty of ice cream for dessert, but there’ll be two different flavors to choose from.

Personally, I think homemade ice cream is the perfect warm-weather dessert, especially after a grilled outdoor meal. I also think it’s fun to do some impromptu entertaining and call up some of our friends, “Hey, we’re making homemade ice cream. Want some? Come on over!” We did that this weekend. With all the fresh strawberries we’re still picking from our garden, it only made sense to make some homemade strawberry ice cream. The recipe is below.

Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream

1 pint fresh strawberries, hulled and sliced
3 T. lemon juice
1 ¼ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 cups heavy whipping cream
1 cup whole milk
1 tsp. vanilla

Combine the strawberries, lemon juice and ½ cup sugar in a mixing bowl. Cover and set for 2 hours. When the time is up, put the mixture through a sieve. Save the juice. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk the eggs until fluffy. Add in the strawberry juice, heavy whipping cream, milk and vanilla. Blend well. Turn on the ice cream maker. Pour in the mixture and let mix until thickened (about 25-30 minutes). During the last 5 minutes of the mixing process, add the sliced strawberries. (If you’d like smaller pieces of strawberry in your ice cream, mash the strawberries slightly before adding them to the ice cream). This will give you a light pink, very “natural” looking ice cream. If the ice cream is still soft after a half hour of churning in the ice cream maker, you can remove the freezer bowl and chill the ice cream in the freezer for a half hour or hour—until frozen enough to your liking.

Happy ice cream making!

~Becky