I’ve made a few versions of this No Churn Ice Cream before – root beer float, savannah buttermint, and orange chocolate flavored – and it’s usually annoying because I buy cream cheese for it and then have 6 ounces leftover. But I recently made a cream cheese glaze for some carrot cake and had 2 ounces of cream cheese leftover – the exact amount to make a batch of this ice cream! So I knew immediately what I had to make, and I decided to make it extra simple, with lemon zest. Because I have some other lemon baking ideas coming up that I think this will pair nicely!
I recently saw a recipe for creamy lemonade on my Instagram feed, and it somewhat inspired this recipe. I think creamy lemon ice cream is better than a lemon sherbet/sorbet! It mellows it out a little bit. And this is really the perfect level of creaminess balanced with citrus.
I used to not be much of a lemonade person, because I always felt like it made me more thirsty. But then I had the best lemonade of my life, and it changed the game. I realized fresh lemonade is really quite something! The best lemonade of my life was at Coachella. They made it with like two whole lemons, juiced and then kept in the cup, with sugar and water. As simple as possible, but with the amount of fresh lemon and sugar, and the fact that I’d been on my feet for two days in the desert and got to enjoy it sitting down… wow. Some great lemonade.
I could probably pretty easily make that at home, but the problem is it takes a lot of lemons, and then you want to chug it because it’s so good. So Lemon Ice Cream will have to do for now!
You may recognize this red bowl from some other photos of ice cream on this site. It’s because it’s my most photogenic bowl. But stay tuned!! I’ve been in take pottery classes, and I’m hoping to make some new bowls and dishware to spruce up some photos. At least… I’ll be able to make some bowls… Plates may be out of reach. We’ll see!
At least one thing I am guaranteed able to make is this no churn lemon ice cream.
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PinIngredients
1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract or vanilla paste
zest of one lemon
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
2 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
2 cups heavy cream
Instructions
In a medium bowl whisk together sweetened condensed milk, vanilla, lemon zest, and salt – set aside.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, beat cream cheese until well softened and spread around the bowl. Add the heavy cream and whip on medium high until stiff peaks form.
Spoon a third of the whipped cream into the condensed milk and whisk to combine. Add another third of the whipped cream to the condensed milk mixture and use a rubber spatula to fold to combine. Add the final third and fold to combine. Spoon into a 9×5-inch loaf pan or another Tupperware, cover with parchment paper, and freeze for at least 4 hours or overnight.
Keep frozen for up to 1 week.