Homemade Ice Cream Sandwiches Two Ways

One item that almost always shows up on the littles’ summer bucket list is making homemade ice cream.  I can’t argue with them… there’s really nothing like it  on a hot summer day.

With Mother in town to inspire and help, we ramped up our game with not one but two homemade ice cream sammies!

For the littles, we all agreed on strawberry ice cream sandwiched between peanut butter cookies.  Mmmmmm… it was REALLY quite good!

And Mother and I were really excited to made honey lavender ice cream with sugar cookies!  I thought the ice cream could have used less honey, Mother thought less lavender.  Hmmm… we both at least agreed it was rich and good.

To make the ice cream sandwiches, I spread the prepared ice cream in cake pans lined with parchment and froze.  Once hard, it is very easy to pull out the parchment, uncover and cut into perfect rounds with a biscuit cutter.  It is really hard out of the freezer, so I first run the cookie cutter under hot water before cutting each piece.

Here are our recipes.  I use a Cuisinart Ice Cream maker that we got as a wedding gift 14 years ago.

Easy Strawberry Ice Cream
2 cups whipping cream
1 cup whole milk
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup (or more!) diced fresh strawberries

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl except strawberries.  Pour into frozen ice cream bowl and turn on for 15 minutes.  Add diced fresh strawberries and mix for 5-10 more minutes.  Move to storage bowl and put in freezer until it reaches desired consistency.

Honey Lavender Ice Cream
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup half-and-half
2/3 cup mild honey
2 tablespoons dried edible lavender flowers (I use these)
2 large eggs
1/8 teaspoon salt

Bring cream, half-and-half, honey, and lavender just to a boil in a 2-quart heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, then remove pan from heat. Let steep, covered, 30 minutes.
Pour cream mixture through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl and discard lavender. Return mixture to cleaned saucepan and heat over moderate heat until hot.
Whisk together eggs and salt in a large bowl, then add 1 cup hot cream mixture in a slow stream, whisking. Pour into remaining hot cream mixture in saucepan and cook over moderately low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until thick enough to coat back of spoon and registers 170 to 175°F on thermometer, about 5 minutes (do not let boil).
Pour custard through sieve into cleaned bowl and cool completely, stirring occasionally. Chill, covered, until cold, at least 3 hours.
Freeze custard in ice cream maker. Transfer ice cream to an airtight container and put in freezer to harden.

Our other favorite ice cream recipes can be found here:

Strawberry Basil Ice Cream

Goat Cheese + Roasted Cherries Ice Cream

Nutella Magic Shell

Lavender Shortbread Cookies (another FAB use for the dried culinary lavendar)

Our air conditioner leaked all over the basement yesterday and Honey has been trying to fix himself to avoid crazy after hours fees.  After sweating it out last night, we think he’s done it!  We’re headed to the pool to cool off and, with any luck, the house will be much more bearable by the time we’re back. Fingers crossed!

xoxo

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