Single Ingredient Ice Cream – No Ice Cream Machine Needed!

I made this a while back for my husband and he really enjoyed it.  I made it again yesterday for my mom.  She was coming for dinner and is on a low fat diet.  She LOVES dessert and I didn’t want her to miss out, so I whipped up a batch of this ice cream for her.  If you like ice cream but don’t want all the fat and calories, this might be the recipe you’ve been waiting for.

Ingredients:

• 4 bananas, just slightly overripe (brown spots good, completely black not so good)
• 2 tbsp. creamy peanut butter (option- thus 2 ingredient ice cream)
• 2 tsp. cocoa powder (Dutch process) (optional – thus 2 or 3 ingredient ice cream depending on peanut butter)

Directions:

DO NOT FREEZE THE WHOLE BANANA.

Peel the bananas and slice them up into ¼ to ½ inch thick disks.  Place the banana slices in the freezer for about an hour or until they’re frozen solid.

Put the frozen slices in a food processor and pulse.  First they’ll start to resemble gravel, but keep going.  The bananas soon turn into a frozen mush – at this point, start scraping the sides down (you’ll do this a lot).  Or you could add a dash of milk since the liquid will help the blending.  After a few minutes of stopping to scrape the sides down, the banana begins to blend into a creamy texture.

When the bananas look like whipped ice cream, you can add your mix-ins like peanut butter and/or cocoa powder, chocolate chips, toffee, raspberries, anything goes!

Straight out of the food processor, the ice cream is like soft serve.  You can also freeze it for a firmer texture.  It’s pretty hard (and therefore, brittle) when scooped immediately after removing it from the freezer.  Give it a minute or two to soften up.  Yield:  2 cups.

I found this recipe at www.userealbutter.com who found it at www.thekitchn.com.

MY NOTES:

1. I always have frozen bananas so I used those.  It’s a little bit difficult to slice the bananas when they’re frozen, but I managed.
2. I used my food processor like the recipe instructed but if you don’t have one, a mixer or Kitchen-Aid would probably work.
3. I made it with the peanut butter and cocoa.  Yummy!
4. If you want photos of the ice cream making process, you can find them at http://userealbutter.com/2010/08/12/single-ingredient-ice-cream-recipe/ and/or http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-creamy-ice-cream-w-93414.  Both of the links have great photos.

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