Blackberry & Peach-Mango Yogurt Ice Cream Duo

Kitty FloridoApril 14, 2014

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Who said that you need an ice cream maker to make ice cream? With this method, you can make your own yogurt ice cream (or Frozen Yogurt, as it is its proper name) with a food processor, but it takes a little bit longer. You need to make it, freeze it, re-pulse it in the food processor and freeze it again. Hey, waiting a little time makes more sense to me than spending $80 on an ice cream maker. Not that I don’t want it. Of course I do.

Now, lets talk about the benefits of making your own ice creams: You add fresh fruit, honey and yogurt. Nothing else. Nothing you can’t name. Three magic ingredients that open up so many possibilities! Initially, I was only going to make the Blackberry Yogurt Ice Cream, but then I saw the peaches in the freezer and the mangoes in the counter. It was a sign from above. I found two great recipes!

After I made them, I tasted both ice creams for sweetness and they were perfect. After freezing them and about to pulse the ice cream into creaminess again, I tasted once more, just to find that they were not as sweet as they were the day before. I talked with Helga later that day and she mentioned that the sweetness is lost a bit during the freezing process (because of all the ice), so it was better for me to add more honey later on. Both recipes have been adjusted to show the final amounts of honey used.

Both recipes called for sugar, but I replaced it with honey. We still have some of that gorgeous organic honey we were gifted a month ago, so I am squeezing the last bits of sweetness from that bottle. Now, why the double pulsing on the food processor? Well, turns out that since we don’t have an ice cream maker, that mixes the fruit and dairy while keeping it cold, we are doing it separately. So, when freezing for the first time, we can gain some ice on top of the ice cream (that’s why we covered the top with plastic wrap as we do it with custard), and we need to incorporate that ice with the rest of the ice cream.

See? This is extremely easy and fun. I still can’t get pass the color of the blackberry yogurt ice cream. It’s just too gorgeous.

Kitty

Peach & Mango Yogurt Ice Cream

Recipe by Aimee Fortney from Not the Perfect Cook
Servings: 6 to 8 servings, ½ cup each

Ingredients:
1 ½ cups yogurt
2 cups frozen sliced peaches
3 cups cubed mango
⅓ cup of honey (more if needed)
beans of a vanilla bean or 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

Add the fruit to the food processor, and process until smooth.
Add the yogurt, vanilla beans (or vanilla extract) and honey. Continue processing until smooth.
Transfer to a covered container, or in my case, a loaf pan lined up with wax paper covered with plastic wrap, and freeze for 8 hours or overnight until it firms up.
Take the container out of the freezer and let sit at room temperature for 30-45 minutes, and fluff it up with a fork. Place ice cream back in the food processor, and pulse until soft and creamy.
Taste the ice cream. If you feel it needs more sweetness, add honey and pulse until it is soft again.
Transfer ice cream to a plastic container with a lid and freeze for a couple of hours. When serving, remove the ice cream from the freezer 20 minutes before doing so, to let it soften.

Blackberry Yogurt Ice Cream

Recipe by Eating Well
Servings: 6 to 8 servings, ½ cup each

Ingredients:
1 ½ cups yogurt
3 ½ cups frozen blackberries *if using fresh blackberries, see note bellow
½ cup of honey (more if needed)

Directions:

Add the blackberries to the food processor and process until it looks like snow or shaved ice.
Add the yogurt and honey. Continue processing until smooth. You’ll have to stop the food processor every few pulses to clean the frozen blackberries and yogurt from the sides of the bowl.
Transfer to a covered container, or in my case, a loaf pan lined up with wax paper covered with plastic wrap, and freeze for 8 hours or overnight until it firms up.
Take the container out of the freezer and let sit at room temperature for 30-45 minutes, and fluff it up with a fork. Place ice cream back in the food processor, and pulse until combined and creamy.
Taste the ice cream. If you feel it needs more sweetness, add honey and pulse until combined.
Transfer ice cream to a plastic container with a lid and freeze for a couple of hours. When serving, remove the ice cream from the freezer 20 minutes before doing so, to let it soften.

Notes:

If you are using fresh blackberries (which we recommend if you don’t like the blackberry seeds in your ice cream), make sure you puree it by itself on step on step 1 until smooth, and then strain it before moving to step 2.