Creamy Soft Homemade Ice Cream without Ice Cream Maker

So finally, summer has picked up in Delhi. It’s May and sun is happily blazing away and I am already on the verge of giving up. But not just yet; it’s only the beginning and we have to put up with it for another 6 months (3 more months of dry heat and another 3 months of humid weather). Let’s hope I wilfully forget the perils of summer and just hang in there!

Now, among the perks of summer is the whole lot of icy cold stuff you get to eat. We have a tiny dairy booth within the community and these days they stock up all sorts of ice candies. Let me admit, I have a thing for ice candies! I still remember, back during my college days in Chennai, we used to have competitions on who could eat the most number of Kwalitys’ orange candies and I have won many hands down! These days our gang of girls stop at this dairy booth in between our evening walks for cold bottle of lassi or chach (buttermilk) and a round of Maha Cola (that’s cola flavoured ice candy and my favourite this season). The little pleasures of summer evenings are among the things that keep you going! :)

When we were children, during summers it was our duty (me and my sister) to clean the refrigerator; mom was particular we did that every Sunday. And in return she used to make delicious ice cream using store bought custard mix - an absolute heavenly concoction of full fat milk, custard powder and sugar, with a hint of vanilla! Those days we used to have aluminium ice trays in fridge (now it is food grade plastic I believe) and that’s where the ice cream went in for freezing. And whatever extra there was (the ice cream mix), used to go into different shaped individual aluminium moulds. And then the longest wait for the ice cream to freeze and finally when we could lay our hands on the individual moulds, oh, that meant the world to us! I still remember the light yellow colour of the ice cream and the taste, lingers on. All these summers, I have felt it’s such a shame that I never tried making ice cream at home.

Nevertheless, it’s better late than never! I finally found a super easy, super awesome way to make homemade ice cream… wait for it… without ice cream maker (although, I have contemplated buying one,  I think it is still not the time for an ice cream machine to enter my kitchen).

Three simple ingredients and you can make the utterly creamy and soft ice cream of your dreams right in your kitchen!

YOU NEED:

For Basic Vanilla Ice Cream

Heavy whipping cream, 2 cups, cold

Sweetened condensed milk, about 1cup, divided

Vanilla extract, 1 tsp, divided

For Mango Ice Cream

Fresh mango pulp, of one large mango

Yellow liquid food colour, 1 tsp

For Peppermint Ice Cream

Peppermint extract, 1 tsp

Blue liquid food colour, 1 tsp

HOW TO:

Keep ready 3 mixing bowls.

In one, add 2 cups of heavy whipping cream and whip the cream to stiff peaks; I used my electric mixer at low speed for about 5 minutes.

Divide the condensed milk and vanilla essence between the other two bowls.

In one of the bowls, add mango pulp and yellow food colour, and beat together to mix well.

In the other bowl, add peppermint extract and blue food colour, and beat together to mix well.

Now pour slightly over half the whipping cream into the mango pulp bowl (adding more than half the whipped cream here because the mango pulp is also sweet and hence more cream will adjust the sweetness) and pour the rest into peppermint bowl.

Fold in the whipped cream in both the bowls, taking care no lumps are formed.

That’s it, transfer to two freezer safe containers and leave it to freeze for 3-5 hours or more.

You have your absolutely creamy and soft ice cream ready! Scoop out a piece of this heaven and bon appetite!