Mint Cookies and Cream Ice Cream

I’m such a spaz. Yesterday I was singing the praises of fall, and today I’m sharing an ice cream recipe that screams summer. But in my mind, ice cream is really a year-round treat, and this particular ice cream is too delicious not to share regardless of the time of year.

This ice cream represents a hybrid of my husband’s two favorite flavors: mint chocolate chip and cookies and cream. Occasionally I like to do nice things for him, and I thought he’d really enjoy this homemade version combining the two. He did. So did I. And so did Andrew. Between the three of us, we polished off the entire batch in less than a week. (Okay, I’ll be honest: It was much less than a week. It may have been more like a couple of days.)

What I love about this ice cream is that it’s not custard-based, so it’s super quick and easy to throw together. The mint Oreos adds such a great minty flavor that you don’t really need to add any mint extract at all. I will change one thing when I make this again, though: I added the cookie pieces while the ice cream was churning in the ice cream maker, and they broke up and made the ice cream look sort of…gray, which wasn’t very appetizing. The gray didn’t go away even when I added green food coloring (which I never really intended to do). Next time I’ll wait until the ice cream is frozen and stir the pieces in then (I’ve indicated this in the recipe below). Regardless of how it looked, though, it sure did taste good!

Mint Cookies and Cream Ice Cream
adapted from Allrecipes

2 cups 2% milk
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 drops green food coloring (optional)
1 1/2 cups mint Oreo cookies, roughly chopped

1. In a large bowl, stir together the milk, cream, sugar, salt, and vanilla extract until the sugar has dissolved. Color to your liking with the green food coloring, if desired.

2. Pour the mixture into an ice cream maker, and freeze according to the manufacturer's instructions. After the ice cream has thickened, about 30 minutes later, stir in cookie pieces. Spoon into a container and freeze for 2 hours before serving.