Making Ice Cream

Making ice cream is such a blast! (Recipe is at the bottom of this post!)

Yes your children told you the truth when they said we made ice cream today.  And what a perfect September 90 degree day to do so!  A lot of shaking, jumping, and moving our bodies around got our ingredients to the right consistency to enjoy a sweet treat today!  The students today were very excited to share with you what they made and are excited to possibly make this at home too!

First we showed off what ingredients we needed as we followed the recipe (remember its posted below).  As each ingredient was shown off, we described the ingredient, discussed the smell, taste, and even texture of it.

Then we began mixing the ingredients.

Then the fun part!  We got to shake it, jump with it, hop with it, and shake it some more.  We began to discuss how the ice felt (warm or cold) and also were able to feel and see the difference in the milk as it became ice cream.

And the best part, eating it!  We sprinkled some sprinkles on the top and enjoyed a refreshing small snack to reward ourselves for #1 our jumping and shaking put to work and #2 an extremely hot September day (made more hot after all that shaking!) 

Delish!  We can't wait to hear what special ingredients you add to your homemade ice cream.  To think, fresh ice cream in less than 30 minutes and little clean up!

Homemade Ice Cream 

What you'll need

·         Ice cubes (enough to fill each gallon-size bag about half full)

·         1 cup half and half

·         1/2 cup salt (The bigger the granules, the better. Kosher or rock salt works best, but table salt is fine. We used rock salt.)

·         2 tablespoons sugar

·         1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

·         1 pint-size ziplock bag

·         1 gallon-size ziplock bag

How to make it:

1.      Combine the sugar, half and half, and vanilla extract in the pint-size bag and seal it tightly.

2.      Place the salt and ice in the gallon-size bag, then place the sealed smaller bag inside as well. Seal the larger bag. Now shake the bags until the mixture hardens (about 5 minutes). Feel the small bag to determine when it's done.

3.      Take the smaller bag out of the larger one, add mix-ins, and eat the ice cream right out of the bag. Easy cleanup too!