Ice Cream in a Bag Recipe

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No ice cream maker required! All you need is ice, rock salt, and a few simple ingredients to shake up inside a bag. A perfect recipe for kids!

Oh man, you guys! I can’t believe I haven’t posted this recipe yet!!

It’s practically pumpkin season (which I’m late posting for every year as it is), and here I am with two summer-y ice cream recipes left to post. Sometimes I just get so obsessed with making more and more and more recipes, that I forget what I’ve already got on hand. ???? *palm to the head*

Anyway. I don’t want to delay sharing this recipe any longer with you guys, so I’m going to jump on in!

Making homemade ice cream was on our bucket list for this summer, but I kept forgetting to put the ice cream canister in the freezer. And I knew the overnight recipe wouldn’t fly with this kid, because… you know. We’d have to wait. ????

But I’m glad we didn’t go that route, because we had so much fun making this ice cream in a bag recipe! Plus, it is absolutely DELICIOUS. I was really pleasantly surprised at how good this ice cream is. I mean… it’s cream and sugar, so how bad can it be, right? But still, I had kind of assumed it might be a little runny or a little icy or a little…. something or other.

But it actually turned out just right. Like, perfect-o.

So how does this magic work? Well, let me tell you all about it!

First, you need some basic ingredients:

✓ Half & half

✓ Sugar

✓ Vanilla extract

✓ Ice

✓ Rock salt (not much)

✓ Gallon sized zip top bags

✓ Toppings

✓ Little helping hands to shake the bag!

You’ll mix together the cream (half & half), sugar, and vanilla and pour it all into a bag– zip that up tight! Then you’ll put that bag into another bag filled with the ice and rock salt (and I’d suggest double bagging here).

And then…. shake, shake, shake, shake!

For 10 whole minutes. You can even play a game of hot potato and toss the bag to each other, which is what we ended up doing, to keep your hands from freezing!

 

Voila! Open the bag, scrape down the sides, and like magic… perfect homemade ice cream in less than 10 minutes without an ice cream machine! (unless you count child labor as a machine… which I don’t ????).

Add toppings and dig in!

Hopefully it’s still warm enough and summer enough wherever you are that you can enjoy a little more homemade ice cream.

I’ve got one more summer-y ice cream recipe coming your way this week, and then hello!  all-things-pumpkin and velvety rich cakes and Thanksgiving pies!