Vegan Pumpkin Spice Ice Cream
Vegan Pumpkin Spice Ice Cream
This ice cream is rich and velvety. It’s like a warm hug on a fall/almost winter day. The spices give it a subtle kick, making sweater weather all that much more enjoyable.
The spices give this ice cream a subtle kick.
Understanding Ingredients
The goal of this recipe was to recreate an ice cream shop experience. My kids are deathly allergic to dairy, eggs, and nuts. Whenever you head to the grocery store to buy ice cream, the flavors are pretty plain.
The non-allergy/ non-vegan folks get all of the adventurous flavors from commercially made ice cream. So, why not make something more exciting?
There are three ingredients that we need to discuss before getting started: lecithin, coconut milk, and cornstarch.
The best ice creams are super fatty and rich from a custard base. The custard base is usually heavy cream and eggs. This recipe was created for vegans and with allergens in mind, so eggs are not an option.
Meet the Players
Let’s go into creating our custard base. Lecithin is an incredible ingredient. Especially for vegan cooking/baking.
It helps to act as an emulsifier attaching the fat to liquids and creating a viscosity that normally an egg would do. It can also substitute as an egg replacer, more on that in the future.
Full fat coconut milk is rich and fatty, but true organic coconut milk isn’t going to have anywhere near the same amount of fat as cream and eggs. It’s just a fact. The lecithin helps us to create a bit more body albeit unnecessary, but there is a difference.
Vegan Pumpkin Spice Ice Cream
Cornstarch is really an essential ingredient. With full fat coconut milks varying so much from one brand to another, this helps to eliminate the variance. It creates a thicker, fuller, custard base with any brand.
Creating the perfect vegan custard
We start by heating up the base. Cooking the custard helps in a couple different ways:
Activating the cornstarch.
Melding the flavors while melting the sugar.
Most vegan sugars are a little less processed. I find that vegan sugar granules are a bit bigger than standard cane sugar. Cooking the base is a huge gain. It makes an ice cream base similar to what we remembered prior to becoming vegan or navigating food allergies.
Final Thoughts and Notes:
More lecithin is not better. If you’re planning on using lecithin, try to adhere to the amount. Lecithin in baking is not as flavor forward. In baking the taste is undetectable, in ice cream too much is definitely noticeable and unappealing.
No ice cream maker? No problem. Check out the notes below the recipe and make it with a spoon and a freezer safe ice cream container.
Let’s get started!
Vegan Pumpkin Spice Ice Cream
Ingredients
Instructions
- Pour all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth.
- Remove ingredients from the blender and pour into a saucepan. Over medium-low heat whisk until slightly thickened. Allow to cool. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
- Once chilled pour the mixture into the ice cream machine and churn according to manufacturer instructions.
- Once complete transfer the ice cream to a loaf pan or a freezer safe container and smooth it down with the back of a spoon and freeze until completely set.
- When the ice cream has set to desired firmness, scoop and enjoy!
Notes:
**If you don’t own an ice cream maker, you can add chilled mixture to a freezer-safe container and freeze. Once every hour, remove from the freezer and stir /whisk to incorporate air. Repeat until mostly firm, roughly 6-8 hours. Then continue freezing until completely firm before serving. It won’t be as smooth, but it should still work.
**If you’re using this Breville Ice Cream Maker there isn’t a need to chill, because it already has a pre-chill function.
