I Scream You Scream We All Scream for Ice Cream

July is National Ice Cream Month! Ice cream is a favorite dessert or snack for many around the world. Vanilla is voted as the best flavor! Did you know that it takes twelve gallons of milk to make one gallon of ice cream?

One of my favorite things to do when I was younger was make ice cream with my family. Since my families Guernsey Cows are milked at a Mennonite farm, because we renovated our milking parlor into the animal hospital for my dad who is a veterinarian, we would drive to the farm where our cows are milked. We would bring home fresh Golden Guernsey Milk! Next we pasteurized the milk, and then used our old fashioned ice cream maker! It was great bonding for my family, and we would wait eagerly for the ice cream to be done. Maybe if we didn't stop the ice cream maker and check to see if it was done so often it would have been done quicker! We would enjoy our delicious vanilla ice cream however we wanted with strawberries, chocolate sauce, peanut butter cups, or any toppings we wanted to enjoy! Sometimes it was best just plain!

So here is an easy way to create memories with your family by making ice cream! You don't even need an ice cream maker! This recipe is perfect for when you just want to make a small portion of ice cream or “wow” your kids! Have fun and enjoy this delicious ice cream plain or with any toppings you have!

Homemade Ice Cream Ingredients

Ice
1 cup Kosher/Coarse Salt
4 Tbsp. Sugar
2 Cups Half & Half
1 Tsp. Vanilla Extract
Gallon-Size Ziploc Bag
Quart-Size Ziploc Bag

1. Mix Sugar, Half & Half and Vanilla Extract and pour into a quart-size Ziploc bag.  (We also made a batch of strawberry ice cream using the same ingredients and adding an additional tbsp. of  sugar and 3/4 cup fresh strawberries and blending).

 2. Place Ice and 1/2 cup of coarse salt in gallon-size Ziploc bag, place bag of ingredients on top of ice. Pour more ice and remainder 1/2 cup of salt and seal bag.

 

SHAKE-SHAKE-SHAKE 7-10 minutes