The Best Homemade French Fries (That You Can Pre-Make for Your Freezer)

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Homemade French Fries are about the most amazing food in the world, my family loves them, and they’re easy to make except for one little thing: They kind of take forever. (Translation: easy and delicious but time consuming. Super bummer.)

The most amazing homemade french fries

Yum

Granted, I have a big family of big eaters. Making French fries is a big deal because I know I’m going to have to commit, you know? Between scrubbing and cutting and frying and cutting and frying and cutting and frying – I’m making fries for at least an hour.

Worth it? Oh my. So much worth it. But not often. It takes too much time.

But guess what I just learned to do? I learned the lovely tricks it takes to make fries ahead of time for the freezer. All the cutting is done ahead so all we have to do at frying time is…fry. Beyond saving me time, I’ve discovered that this method of slightly pre-cooking them before frying is what crispy, perfect fries are made of.

Come closer and learn with me.

The BEST Homemade Fries

How to Make and Freeze the BEST Homemade French Fries

1. Scrub a bunch of potatoes (or if you’re me, you ask your kids to scrub a bunch of potatoes, which they are happy to do because French Fries).

2. Cut the potatoes into fries – your preference on how thick or thin.

3. Put the cut potatoes into a big pot of water. Bring to a boil.

4. Once water/potatoes comes to a boil, remove the potatoes from heat and strain, running the potatoes under cold water to cool and stop the cooking process.

5. Blot the potatoes dry on a towel.

6. Transfer prepped fries into freezer bags for future use (although you might consider frying some immediately and I bet no one will argue).

7. Freeze prepped French fries in freezer bags for up to two months.

8. At frying time, get the fries out of the freezer a few minutes before you want to cook them.

9. Fry until crispy perfection has been reached. (I have a fryer similar to this and I love it. I use Palm Shortening for healthy and safe frying.)

WARNING: Watch that the fries aren’t holding extra water as they will splatter when frying! Blot prepared fries with a towel before frying if necessary.

How to Make and Freeze the Best Homemade Fries

You’ll never go back to making fries any other way after experiencing these.

Other fun Make-Ahead Recipes I’ve shared recently:

That list looks like a bunch of junk food, but it’s not! How great that we can make all of our favorites with healthier ingredients!

I also recently shared these gems:

Did you find some of these recipes to be helpful? Slowly but surely we can get ahead in the kitchen!

Related posts:

  1. Easy 5-Minute Frozen Yogurt Cups
  2. Raspberry Oatmeal Bars
  3. Cheesy Vegetable Casserole
  4. Americana Cheesecake Parfaits (It’s too easy)

Why You Should Eat Fat Bombs (and a Recipe!)

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A few weeks ago while researching how I could add more fat into my diet, I came across this recipe for Fat Bombs.

fat-bombs-easy-and-delicious

That, my friends, is a Fat Bomb. They look like something terribly naughty. But instead, they are full of so much good nourishment! Your day just took a turn for the better. You have no idea how happy I am to share these with you!

Have you ever even heard of Fat Bombs? I sure hadn’t. But the biggest question is: why would I try to see how I could add more fat to my diet?

Well, I’ve been reading and studying more about regulating my hormones and blood sugar and keeping my adrenals functioning well – you know. Just a little light reading. Everything keeps pointing me back to “eat a lot of protein” and “eat a lot of good fats.” Hey, you don’t have to tell me twice.

Now, protein is an easy one for me. I love and crave meat most of the time. But I have been realizing that getting plenty of fat is a little bit more difficult (beyond what is naturally in the meat I’m being forced to eat). I’ve tried eating spoonfuls of coconut oil, but it’s just weird and I don’t love it.

diary3

See here’s the funny thing: I find that I mostly use butter and coconut oil in baked goods. But I’m no longer eating many baked goods. I can stir some butter into my veggies, but that’s still not very much fat. Cream in my coffee? Sure, but I’m trying to cut back on caffeine too (prayers welcome).

I’d be mad at my hormones and blood sugar and adrenals about all of this, but my quest to find wellness for all of these led me to find out about these Fat Bombs. So ALL IS FORGIVEN.

fat-bombs-rock

Everyone else can have their sugary cakes and cookies and I don’t even care because I get to eat Fat Bombs. They are kind of a cross between a Peanut Butter Cup and a Huge Piece of Fudge. No one feels sorry for me now. Everyone is jealous. But not to worry. I am here to share the recipe so that you, too, can make Fat Bombs.

Now, first, a warning: If you are expecting these to taste super sweet like a piece of Christmas fudge or an actual peanut butter cup, you will be disappointed. But if you appreciate the need to cut back on sugar and you prepare yourself for a lightly sweetened peanut butter chocolate treat, you will bite in and be so happy that you get to eat many bites before it’s gone. Yes, you will be so, so happy.

You will offer them to your family, saying something like, “These are so amazing!!!! You won’t like them, though.”

This is how things normally work with my family now. My husband is totally digging my sugarless, stevia-sweetened or otherwise very low sugar treats. Our boys are more skeptical. I’ve cut down the sugar drastically in our household, and they’ve barely noticed and are just fine with muffins, cookies, and cakes with the sugar cut down. But the stevia-only treats? They are not fans.

But as for me, I’m loving the Fat Bombs. So far I’ve only made a Chocolate Peanut Butter variety but a little Pinterest searching told me there are other kinds that I should try. Okay then. If you’re going to twist my arm.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Fat BombsYum

5.0 from 1 reviews
Chocolate Peanut Butter Fat Bombs
 
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Serves: 12
Ingredients
  • ½ cup coconut oil (I use expeller pressed so the coconut flavor didn't overpower.)
  • 1 heaping Tablespoon cocoa powder
  • 4 Tablespoons butter
  • ½ cup natural peanut butter
  • Liquid stevia to taste (I use 1½ droppers full of NuNaturals Brand.)
Instructions
  1. In a small saucepan, heat and stir together coconut oil, cocoa powder, butter, and peanut butter.
  2. Once melted and mixed, remove from heat and stir in stevia.
  3. Pour into 12 muffin lined muffin tins.
  4. Freeze for 20 minutes or refrigerate for 2 hours.
  5. Store in fridge and eat as needed.

chocolate-peanut-butter-fat-bombs

Isn’t it happy irony that these also have protein in them? It’s like I’m getting a two for one on needed nutrients here.

Note: These do not taste as yummy when they are room temp. Keep them cold and eat them directly out of the fridge. Take it from me.

Fun Fat Fact: It’s hard to over-eat these. After two bites I always think that I will finish one and enjoy a second because I’m loving it so much. But by the time I finish the one, I am full and satisfied, ready to stop eating. Then I stay full for a couple of hours, which is great because I typically need to eat little bits all day long.

I love this about good fats. They satisfy. (As opposed to empty carbs or bad fats that tell your body that you need more in order to be satisfied, so we tend to over eat them.)

Why Good Fat is Good

  • It gives us energy. (So don’t eat fat if you prefer to be lethargic.)
  • It builds healthy cells.
  • It helps our bodies use Vitamins A, D, E, and K.
  • It helps us have healthy skin, as well as helps our other organs to be protected. (Skin is an organ. I always forget this, but I think it’s so cool.)

So there you go. We all need to be eating good fats. These Fat Bombs make eating good fats extremely fun and happy, and they only take a few minutes to stir together.

Oh how I hope you like the Fat Bombs as much as I do. Best treat ever. (So says the girl who hasn’t had a cookie for a very long time.)

Related posts:

  1. No-Bake Snickerdoodle Bites – A Quick and Easy Low Sugar Treat
  2. No-Bake Peanut Butter Cookie Bites
  3. Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine
  4. Make Orange Creamsicle Ice Cream – No Ice Cream Freezer Required

Easy 5-Minute Frozen Yogurt Cups

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I think I just discovered my new favorite snack. Look at these adorable Frozen Yogurt Cups!

Frozen Yogurt Cups

How is it that just when I think there can’t possibly be any more great new food ideas, I come across another wonderful new way to make something delicious and fun? I love how many wonderful ways we can enjoy real food.

I am one of the biggest food geeks. Nobody loves food as much as I. Except for maybe you, which is why you and I have so much fun together here. Isn’t food so very much fun!?!?!!!!!!

frozen yogurt2

At the very least, we all love to eat. It’s just that some of us like to also gawk at our groceries, get a thrill out of creating fun menus, and dream daily of new recipe ideas. Occasionally we might tear up when we look at the full shelves in our beautiful pantry. Some of us.

All this excitement over little frozen yogurt cups. Hey. You have no idea. I saw this idea and loved it, but I didn’t know that I would love it, love it. But the easiness of this idea! The endless options of what can be done to create variations that every family member will like! The deliciousness.

frozen yogurt4

Because making Frozen Yogurt Cups is so very easy, this would be a great “recipe” to hand over to your kids to make. Everyone can create these with their favorite goodies (granola, berries, nuts, peanut butter, chocolate chips…).

You can buy pre-made, flavored yogurt if you like, but since many store-bought options are so loaded with sugar and other not-so-great ingredients, I much prefer to buy or make Whole Milk Plain Yogurt and add my own sweetener and vanilla. If you don’t make your own yogurt, plain store-bought yogurt works just fine for this “recipe.”

It’s easy to make yogurt: learn more here.

Easy 5-Minute Frozen Yogurt CupsYum

Easy 5-Minute Frozen Yogurt Cups
 
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Serves: 10-12
Ingredients
  • 1 cup whole milk plain yogurt
  • Sweetener of choice (I used 1-2 Tablespoons real maple syrup)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • Toppings like fresh berries or peaches, granola, chocolate chips, etc.
Instructions
  1. Prepare muffin tins with liners (I used silicone liners which makes this very simple!)
  2. Stir together yogurt, sweetener, and vanilla until well combined.
  3. Scoop 2-3 Tablespoons of yogurt mixture into prepared muffin cups.
  4. Top with fruit if you like.
  5. Freeze for 1-2 hours until solid.
  6. Serve.
  7. Transfer leftovers to a freezer bag and pull out for snacking as needed.

Easy Frozen Yogurt Cups

To Fantastic Frozen Yogurt Cup Tips:

1) These worked wonderfully in my Silicone Baking Cups. They popped right out once frozen and clean up was so simple!

2) You can use your Frozen Yogurt Cups to make smoothies! I mean, frozen yogurt and berries? This is what smoothies are made of. Throw some Frozen Yogurt Cups into a blender with a little milk and you’re set!

Raise your hand (and leave a comment) if you’re a food geek like me. Raise your hand (and leave a comment) if you aren’t a food geek, but appreciate that other are so that you can enjoy eating yummy food. See, everyone wins. :)

 

Related posts:

  1. Low Sugar Strawberry Cheesecake Parfait (With a “To-Go” Option)
  2. Raspberry Oatmeal Bars
  3. Low Sugar Dairy Free Chocolate Sauce (3 Ingredients!)
  4. Americana Cheesecake Parfaits (It’s too easy)

Low Sugar Chocolate Ice Cream – No Churn!

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If the Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream would work with three ingredients without being churned, I figured a Chocolate version would work.

I was right!

Low Sugar Chocolate Ice Cream Bowl

Several suggested that if we added whole milk to the cream/sweetener/vanilla combo it would scoop out nicely. I tried that on my round two of ice cream and didn’t find it to work as well as the milkless version. I’ve decided to stick with only cream and not add milk. I’m curious what you discovered if you tried the recipe!

The only adjustment you need to make to make a chocolate version is to simply add cocoa powder to the vanilla ice cream recipe. (And if you want Chocolate Mint, just switch the vanilla extract with some mint extract. Easy!)

Low Sugar Chocolate Ice CreamYum

Low Sugar Chocolate Ice Cream - No Churn!
 
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Ingredients
  • 2 cups heavy whipping cream
  • 3 Tablespoons real maple syrup (more or less to taste)
  • 3 heaping Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. Blend ingredients together with a hand mixer or in a high power blender until they have thickened - but have not yet turned into stiff whipped cream. (The mixture should still be runny.)
  2. Pour mixture into a small casserole dish.
  3. Cover and freeze for about three hours.
  4. Scoop and serve right away.
  5. If ice cream has been in the freezer overnight, you may need to let it sit out to soften for a few minutes before serving.

Low Sugar Chocolate Ice Cream

If you didn’t guess already, this ice cream tastes delicious in my favorite Coffee Milkshake. Follow the recipe here, scoop in some of this chocolate ice cream, and you’ll have a Chocolate Mocha Milkshake.

Still to come as I continue to experiment – Low Sugar Peaches and Cream, Strawberry, and Peanut Butter Ice Cream! Hmm, while I’m at it, I suppose I should try a Mocha Ice Cream. This is too much fun.

Related posts:

  1. Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine
  2. Low Sugar Strawberry Cheesecake Parfait (With a “To-Go” Option)
  3. Make Orange Creamsicle Ice Cream – No Ice Cream Freezer Required
  4. Low Sugar Dairy Free Chocolate Sauce (3 Ingredients!)

Easy Blue Raspberry Salad

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Blue Razz Salad

Back when we embarked on a Shaved Ice Business (which seems like thousands of years ago), the favorite flavor many kids chose was “Blue Razz.” Those were the early days of our healthy eating journey when I was learning more about the nastiness of artificial colors and flavors. I just couldn’t get over the fact that fun and gimmicky names really did market themselves well, even if they didn’t make sense. After all, raspberries aren’t blue.

I’m such a boring, practical mom type.

Me: Children, why would you want to eat something that isn’t true to its name?? Raspberries aren’t blue, you know.
Children: Maybe because we’re kids and it’s FUN!!?!?!!!!
Me: Fine. Turn your tongue, lips, and teeth blue. Rot your insides. I don’t even care.

None of these words were actually spoken out loud.

All of this is irrelevant to what I’m about to share, but it did occur to me as I was playing with this recipe that indeed, we were creating a Blue Razz Salad. But instead of a fake blue with a freak flavor, we’re using real blueberries and actual raspberries. Who knew real food could turn out something so fun and trendy? (We all knew this. None of this shocks us. We already know that real food tastes good and that actual fruit is very pretty.)

Blueberry Raspberry Salad

Blue Raspberry SaladYum

Easy Blue Raspberry Salad
 
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Serves: 6
Ingredients
  • ¾ cup fresh or frozen blueberries
  • ¾ cup fresh or frozen raspberries
  • 2 cups heavy whipping cream
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
  • Sweetener of choice (I used 10ish drops of stevia)
Instructions
  1. Make a blueberry "syrup" by cooking blueberries in a small saucepan on low until they have cooked down and thickened. (Add a little sugar or honey to this if you like.)
  2. In another saucepan, make a raspberry "syrup" in the same way. Both fruits take 10-15 minutes to cook down and thicken. Stir occasionally.
  3. If you want your salad to be creamy, blend the cooked fruits until smooth. If you don't mind chunks of fruit, leave the cooked fruit as-is.
  4. In the meantime, whip cream, vanilla, and sweetener until thick.
  5. Fold thickened fruit into the whipped cream until just mixed.
  6. Cover and chill salad for at least 2 hours before serving.

Blue Raspberry Salad - no sugar added!

I find this salad to be perfectly sweet because of the fruit and stevia (read more about stevia here), but we all know I’m the one who likes unsweet tea and barely sweet treats. Therefore, if you find that you would like this to be sweeter than it is, simply add a few teaspoons of sugar or honey to your fruit while it is cooking.

Now I invite you to make and eat what tastes delicious and will not make your mouth look like you are turning into a Smurf.

Related posts:

  1. Easy Cheesy Bean Dip
  2. Real Food “Velveeta” and Rotel Recipe
  3. How to Make Gatorade
  4. Strawberry Spinach Salad with Vinaigrette Dressing

Iced Chocolate Using Homemade Nesquik!

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Iced Chocolate

When you are the youngest of four boys, growing up in a home filled with silliness and sarcasm, you pretty much have no hope of becoming anything but silly and sarcastic.

Malachi, our 11 year old, barely remembers how to shoot it straight anymore. When we say, “How’s your project going?” he’ll answer with an enthusiastic, “Terrible!” which of course translates to mean, “I’m making some great headway here.”

This is funny-not funny because sometimes I just really need to know the answer to something without being given the run around. And then there is the issue with him using sarcasm around younger kids or unsuspecting adults. Someone might say, “You look nice today, Malachi.” and he’ll come back with with a happy, “I know.” which takes people off guard and I always hope they know he’s kidding.

We’re working on teaching discernment on when to be “funny” and when to simply answer a question already.

In the meantime, I tried a new recipe a readers sent to me that sounded amazing, but then of course, I cut down the sugar so I didn’t send everyone off to Bible class with a major sugar high. I prepared the drink, then ran upstairs to finish getting ready for church. Later when I hesitantly hollered down, “Does it taste okay? Do you like it?” Malachi promptly answered with, “No. It is really not good.”

Oh man, I had hoped this would be a fun, refreshing, filling drink I could make this summer. Oh well, I’d move on to the next idea.

Then he smiled and said, “It’s actually really amazing. Make it again.”

That kid!! I give up.

(Because that’s what frustrated parents do. They give up. They stop trying. There is no other way.)  Weird. It’s as if Malachi comes by his sarcasm naturally.

We’ll continue to work on when to be silly and when to shoot it straight, but according to Malachi, you should definitely not try this recipe. You won’t even like it. It’s disgusting.

Welcome to my world.

Iced Chocolate Using Homemade NesquikYum

By the way, all credit goes to Laura on this one. Not me. Another Laura. Laura D. She emailed me this idea!

Iced Chocolate Using Homemade Nesquik!
 
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Serves: 3 servings
Ingredients
  • 3 cups whole milk
  • ½ cup Homemade Nesquik (see recipe below)
  • 2 cups ice cubes
Instructions
  1. Blend ingredients on high in the blender until smooth.
  2. Serve right away.

You’ll find my easy Homemade Nesquik recipe here.

Delicious and Easy Iced Chocolate

Take note that there’s still quite a bit of sugar in this because I don’t know how to adjust that in my Homemade Nesquik recipe. This makes for a great summer treat, though!

Thank you Laura D. for sending in this recipe idea. Malachi really does appreciate it, even though you might not be able to tell at first. :)

Related posts:

  1. Orange Creamsicle Recipe
  2. 7-Minute Strawberry Ice Cream ~ Dairy Free Option
  3. Make Your Own “Nesquik”
  4. How to Make Iced Coffee for a Crowd

Easy Taco Salad Recipe

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I sort of shared this “recipe” back in 2010 when I first posted my Homemade French Dressing recipe. Since then I’ve had several people tell me that they’d prefer me to write out an actual recipe. It’s only taken me 6 years to do it. Therefore, if you have any requests, ask now. First come, first served – I shall answer your requests by 2022.

I hope I’m kidding.

taco salad1

A key player in this salad is the French Dressing. I used to toss this with bottled Catalina Dressing, but the homemade variety is easy and better for us. If I don’t happen to have time to make the French Dressing, we just dump in a little salsa. It changes the taste of this salad, but it’s still a great meal!

I shall now attempt to write down measurable quantities of salad fixin’s to provide an actual Taco Salad recipe. If in fact you don’t follow this recipe precisely, you will still turn out a fabulous Taco Salad. For that matter, since everyone in my family has specific preferences (some like tomatoes, some don’t; some like beans, some don’t) I often lay out all the salad makings and let everyone build their own bowl however they like!

Easy Taco SaladYum

Easy Taco Salad Recipe
 
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Serves: 4-6
Ingredients
  • 1 pound hamburger
  • 2 Tablespoons taco seasoning mix
  • 1 head lettuce, any variety (we prefer red leaf, green leaf or romaine)
  • 1 cup shredded cheddar or Colby jack cheese
  • 15 ounces (or 2 cups) of pinto, chili, or black beans
  • 1 cup diced fresh tomatoes
  • 1-2 cups crushed tortilla chips
  • 1 cup French Dressing (give or take)
Instructions
  1. Brown hamburger meat and season with taco seasoning mix (recipe link below)
  2. Chop or tear lettuce into a large serving bowl.
  3. Add cooked meat (cooled), shredded cheese, beans, tomatoes, and chips.
  4. Toss with French Dressing.
  5. Serve.

Other fun Taco Salad toss-in options are:

  • Black olives
  • Guacamole
  • Salsa
  • Onions
  • Peppers

I recommend making this Taco Seasoning Mix to have on hand for recipes like this. Easy and delicious!

Easy Taco Salad

We will likely enjoy this Taco Salad every week until the end of summer. How about you? Are you a Taco Salad fan?

Related posts:

  1. Easy Cheesy Bean Dip
  2. Real Food “Velveeta” and Rotel Recipe
  3. How to Cook Beans in the Crock Pot
  4. Strawberry Spinach Salad with Vinaigrette Dressing

How to Make Peach Sweet (or Unsweet) Tea

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If I like the Iced Mango Tea (which I do), I think like this Peach Tea even more. Talk about refreshment on a hot day!

Peach Tea

The trick I learned since starting to play with fruity tea recipes is that it works best if we add just a tiny bit of honey or sugar to the fruit and water while we bring it to a boil. This brings out the natural sweetness and great flavor of the fruit. I wondered if this might make the tea too sweet for my liking (I’m an unsweet tea girl). But I find it to be just right. On the other hand, my husband (who likes sweet tea), doesn’t mind drinking this tea as-is, without any added sugar beyond the tiny bit of honey I add to the fruit during the boiling process.

Experiment with this and see if you can also cut down on the sugar by letting the fruit do the job naturally!

Peach Sweet (or Unsweet) TeaYum

5.0 from 1 reviews
How to Make Peach Sweet (or Unsweet) Tea
 
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Serves: ½ gallon
Ingredients
  • 2 quarts of water, divided
  • 4-5 ripe peaches, sliced
  • 4-8 tea bags of your favorite black or green tea, depending on how strong you like your tea
  • Liquid stevia, honey, or sugar to taste
Instructions
  1. In a medium-sized pot, heat 1 quart of water and the peaches to boiling. Add a teaspoon of sugar or honey if you like. This will help make a "peach syrup."
  2. Simmer for about five minutes.
  3. Mush the peaches in the water and add the tea bags.
  4. Allow tea to steep for 5-10 minutes.
  5. Strain tea into a ½ gallon jar or pitcher.
  6. Add a quart of water.
  7. Stir in stevia or sugar if you want your tea sweetened.
  8. Refrigerate until thoroughly chilled.
  9. Serve over ice.

How to Make Peach Tea

Be sure to also try the Mango Sweet (or Unsweet) Tea along with this Peach Tea. See which you like best. Up next, Raspberry Sweet (or Unsweet) Tea!

Related posts:

  1. Easy Peppermint Milkshakes
  2. Real Food “Velveeta” and Rotel Recipe
  3. Pineapple Fluff Salad (All Real Food Ingredients!)
  4. Easy (Make-Ahead) Baked Potato and Bacon Casserole

Low Sugar Coffee Milkshake Recipe

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If you’re wondering what I’m up to every single afternoon of every day during the entire summer – and obviously, you surely do wonder – you can be certain that I am making myself a smooth and creamy coffee shake and sipping it slowly. This, at about 1:30 each afternoon, CST. Set your clock by it. At 1:30 each day, you can think to yourself, Laura is most certainly enjoying her coffee milkshake right about now. We are so happy for her.

Thank you for your support.

Coffee Milkshake

I would love for you to also have the option of beginning your afternoon in this way, so please, allow me to share this recipe so you can indulge and love your treat right down to the last drop. The good news is that this is very low in sugar (though you can add more if you like!) and includes all real food ingredients. I suppose the other good news is that the coffee will perk us all up for the afternoon so that we can rock on with whatever it is we need to do. Hi-yah! Glory, hallelujah.

Perhaps the one draw back to making this milkshake is that you must think and plan ahead. Hot coffee ruins the moment. All key ingredients must be cold or even frozen. And then there’s the homemade ice cream issue. The ice cream amazing and easy, but too hard to scoop if not set out a few minutes ahead of your milkshake making endeavors. So here’s the breakdown so that you can achieve Low Sugar Coffee Milkshake perfection:

  1. Cold brew some coffee, or make regular hot brew and chill it thoroughly.
  2. Make yourself some coffee iced cubes. This isn’t a must, but almost.
  3. Be sure to have Homemade Low Sugar Ice Cream in the freezer (it’s easier than you think).
  4. Set your ice cream out on the counter about ten minutes before making your shake so that it will be soft enough to scoop.

Don’t get the impression that this is a high maintenance recipe. It really is not. I typically have coffee in my fridge and coffee cubes in my freezer. It takes 2 minutes to whip up a batch of this Homemade Low Sugar Ice Cream. Then it’s just a matter of pulling it all together. At 1:30 every single afternoon.

Low Sugar Coffee MilkshakeYum

Low Sugar Coffee Milkshake Recipe
 
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Ingredients
  • 1-2 scoops Homemade Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream
  • 4-6 coffee ice cubes
  • 1-2 cups cold coffee
Instructions
  1. Mix all ingredients thoroughly in a blender.
  2. Serve right away.

low sugar coffee milkshake

Take note that this is not a super-sweet treat as is, so you’ll want to adjust the sweetness level by adding maple syrup according to your taste. I personally love it with a strong coffee flavor and only a tiny bit of sweetness and creaminess. But the beauty of this recipe and the Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream recipe is that you can make it sweet or less sweet without messing anything up!

Get your ingredients ready! 1:30 will be here before you know it.

Related posts:

  1. Low Sugar Strawberry Cheesecake Parfait (With a “To-Go” Option)
  2. Dark Chocolate Peppermint Mousse
  3. Low Sugar Almond Fudge Bars
  4. Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine

Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine

by 16 Comments

I just ate a bowl of vanilla ice cream. This hasn’t happened in over three years because my body gets mad at me now when I eat much sugar. But let me say it again: I just ate a bowl of ice cream. Happy, happy, happy, happy!!

Low Sugar Ice Cream

I’ve been wanting to figure out how to make low sugar ice cream (for three years), but I had two hang-ups:

  1. I was feeling pretty lazy about pulling out my ice cream freezer.
  2. I wasn’t confident that cutting the sugar in ice cream would taste good and I didn’t want to waste ingredients.

So I started doing some looking online. There are plenty of recipes for “no churn” ice cream so I could avoid the trouble of getting out my ice cream machine, but they all call for sweetened condensed milk. Nope. That wouldn’t make it low sugar.

Other recipes took way too many steps, at which point I figured I might as well suck it up and get out my ice cream freezer.

Finally, I decided to try the “no-churn” method I’d read about – but with healthier ingredients I feel good about instead of condensed milk – and just see what would happen. I decided if it didn’t turn out – at the very least I could re-purpose the cream mixture into a smoothie.

When you see this recipe you will wonder (like I am wondering) why it took me so much research and time to figure this out.

Three ingredients. Three. They are so obvious. (Cream, maple syrup, vanilla. See? Why did I make this so hard?)

The trick is to whip the ingredients together just long enough that they thicken, but don’t turn into whipped cream. This isn’t hard as long as you’re watching carefully. I put the ingredients into my Blendtec, whipped for 15-20 seconds, poured the mixture into a dish, froze it, and boom. I had Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream.

Low Sugar Vanilla Ice CreamYum

5.0 from 3 reviews
Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream ~ 3 Ingredients ~ No Machine
 
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Author:
Serves: 6-8
Ingredients
  • 2 cups heavy whipping cream
  • 3 Tablespoons real maple syrup (more or less to taste)
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. Blend ingredients together with a hand mixer or in a high power blender until they have thickened - but have not yet turned into stiff whipped cream. (The mixture should still be runny.)
  2. Pour mixture into a small casserole dish.
  3. Cover and freeze for about three hours.
  4. Scoop and serve right away.
  5. If ice cream is left in the freezer overnight, you may need to let it sit on the counter a few minutes before serving!

Low Sugar Vanilla Ice Cream

A key player in this recipe is Homemade Vanilla Extract. I decided “why just add one teaspoon when I could add two?” This, of course, makes the ice cream much, much better tasting. (Ironic, isn’t it, since I was just saying that you can use half the amount called for in recipes since this vanilla is so potent? Use less vanilla in this if you like, but I am loving the strong vanilla punch of two teaspoons in this vanilla ice cream!)

I learned that if you freeze this for less than 3 hours, the ice cream will be too liquidy. But if you freeze it for more than 3 hours it becomes a bit hard. The solution for “too hard” ice cream? Simply pull it out of the freezer and let it sit on the counter for about 10 minutes before serving. It’ll soften just enough for you to scoop it out.

low sugar icecream5low sugar icecream4

Want your ice cream to be not-so-low in sugar?

My kids agree. Simply add a little more maple syrup until you have reached your desired sweetness level. You might also try adding a few drops of liquid stevia.

Because we have the whole summer ahead of us, I will now spend time creating variations of this Low Sugar Homemade Ice Cream. I’m thinking peach, strawberry, chocolate, mint, chocolate mint, and whatever other ideas you have for me.

Go make yourself some ice cream!!

Related posts:

  1. No-Bake Snickerdoodle Bites – A Quick and Easy Low Sugar Treat
  2. Low Sugar Strawberry Cheesecake Parfait (With a “To-Go” Option)
  3. Make Orange Creamsicle Ice Cream – No Ice Cream Freezer Required
  4. No-Bake Peanut Butter Cookie Bites