Who doesn't love ice cream?! Just about everyone, right? Especially kids. I started making homemade ice cream for my kids years ago, which they love. What I love is that I can make it on demand, quickly and easily, and that I can feel good about what they are eating.
All you do is blend yogurt and frozen fruit in your blender or food processor. That's it! The result is a soft serve like consistency fruity "ice cream" that kids love!
I use Stoneyfield yogurt - either flavored or plain. Flavored makes it a little sweeter, and adds some more flavoring which is sometimes nice depending on what fruit you are using. Plain works well too.
The other fun part is your kids can pick the flavor combos. We pick a lot of berries (or buy them from the farmers market), as well as peaches, which I then freeze (it's more economical). I usually buy already frozen pineapple and mango, though. So, we normally have a good selection of options, though a lot of time we opt for just your standard one fruit variety, like strawberry, or peach or blueberry.
Here are some of our favorite combos:
- Strawberry banana {the banana does not need to be frozen if the strawberries are}
- Mango pineapple
- Strawberry blueberry
- Mango pineapple peach {love this! add some coconut oil or shreds for a more tropical taste}
- Strawberry cherry
- Strawberry pineapple
- Pineapple peach
- Banana chocolate {frozen banana and cocoa powder - no yogurt needed}
- Banana peanut butter or other nut butter
- Banana chocolate peanut butter {frozen banana, PB and cocoa powder}
...and the list goes on and on! If a little sweetening is ever needed, I opt for a little local honey or pure maple syrup, or maybe coconut sugar. A little more flavored yogurt or a few pieces of a sweeter fruit also does the trick too.
Now, when they say "can we have ice cream?" You can say "Yes, what kind would you like?" {and feel good about it!} You can even add a little ground flax seed and they won't even know {I've done it}!
