Cheap Eats

A few years back we received an electric ice cream maker as a Christmas gift.  Making your own ice cream sounds like a really fun idea, but I thought it would be too complicated, so our ice cream maker just ended up sitting on the back shelf.  But finally, in the spirit of eating healthy and saving money, I decided we needed to try it out.

The recipe I used was straight off the box and did involve eggs, which concerned me a little, but you do cook them really quick, so I guess that’s all they need.  The only changes I made were to the fat content, I used 1% milk instead of whole, and half-and-half instead of whipping cream.  That may be why the consistency was not like store bought.  It was really hard straight out of the freezer, but then when you let it sit out a little bit, it just turned into a milk shake. 

The good news is that it tasted great! Just like you would expect homemade ice cream to taste.  The recipe was not too complicated and the ice cream maker was very easy to set up and clean.  So we will definitely be doing it again.

Next I want to try frozen yogurt.  I would really like to perfect an awesome frozen yogurt recipe because that would be the ideal dessert.  One of the biggest advantages to making your own is that you use real yogurt, which has all the good active cultures in it.

The recipe I am going to try is for cherry frozen yogurt.  All you need is 2 c. cherries, 4 c. plain yogurt, 1 c. whipping cream, 2/3 c. sugar and 1 tbs. vanilla.    Couldn’t be simpler!

I haven’t yet actually broken down the cost of making your own vs. buying or the fat content yet, but I intend to.  I have to know how much money and calories I am saving!