KosherEye.com
By Diane Schnier, RealFoodTastesGood.com
You will absolutely not believe how creamy and delicious this is. It is jaw dropping considering how easy and healthy it is. Who needs all the corn syrup, liquid sugar, carrageenan, milk fat, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, guar gum….etc. Who even needs an ice cream maker! Once your bananas are frozen, this takes only one measly minute to make in the Vitamix or another other powerful blender (or a bit longer if using a food processor).The recipe is so easy that it will become your "go-to" ice cream recipe. The basic recipe can be changed with the addition of fruit, coconut, chocolate, peanut butter, pecans...anything you want.
Ingredients:
4 large bananas, sliced & frozen
1/2 cup milk of choice
Directions:
Cut bananas into rounds and place in single layer on a wax (or parchment) paper covered cookie sheet.
Put cookie sheet in freezer for several hours or overnight.
Vitamix blender method:
Place frozen bananas in blender, add milk, and blend on high, using the tamper to continually push banana chunks into the blade area.
Within 1 minute, you’ll have creamy ice cream. Blender will be loud as it’s doing it’s thing, but this is normal.
Food processor method:
Make sure work bowl is fitted with steel S blade. Add banana chunks and start processing. While the machine is running, slowly drizzle in the milk.
You’ll need to stop the food processor several times to reposition the banana chunks (they often end up stuck and sitting on top of the blades).
Within 5 to 10 minutes, you should have creamy ice cream.
Notes:
Yield: For four servings:
Use ripe bananas! If they have any green on them, the ice cream won’t taste good. Even when I’ve used bananas that were all yellow (no green or brown), it didn’t taste quite as good as it had in the past. SPECKLED BANANAS ARE BEST!! Also, they must be thoroughly frozen or the ice cream won’t turn out.
If your bananas are small, use less milk. You want to be careful not to use too much liquid or it will end up more like a shake (though worse things could happen in this world). My rule of thumb when pulling banana chunks out of my freezer to make this ice cream – 15 chunks equals 1 large banana. The most I ever make at one time in my large Vitamix container is 4 servings (which would be 60 banana chunks and 1/2 cup of milk).
This ice cream is best eaten right away, so try not to make more than you’ll want. If you do end up with extra (this is hard to do!), you can freeze it, but let it thaw before you eat. (What you see in the photo is this recipe cut in half – 2 bananas worth. My daughter & I shared it & it was PLENTY.)
For the liquid, I’ve used coconut milk, almond milk, raw milk, pineapple juice, and [cold] coffee with great results.
Variations:
• Make a Caribbean version by adding pineapple (frozen or fresh) (or pineapple juice instead of milk), unsweetened shredded coconut (or a few dollops of coconut butter) and/or coconut milk.
• Make peanut butter ice cream by adding about 1/4 cup of natural peanut butter (may need to add a little extra milk)
• Make strawberry ice cream by adding a handful of fresh or frozen strawberries.
• Make chocolate ice cream by adding a handful of high quality chocolate chips/nibs or cocoa powder
• Maple pecan ice cream? Peach ice cream? You get the idea – add anything you want. Keep in mind however, whatever you add has to be in addition to the bananas, as the bananas are what makes this ice cream ice cream! The liquid component is essential as well. After that, use your imagination!