Almond Joy Coconut Ice Cream (Dairy Free and Low Sugar)—The Secret Recipe Club

I think it’s crazy how FAST the months are flying by, especially when it comes to the new monthly Secret Recipe Club I’m cooking/baking/churning along with.  But here we are again!  I’ve got some delicious dairy free Almond Joy Coconut Ice Cream to share today. 

The blog I have this month is Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy.  I had not heard of Anne’s blog before, but that is one of the fun things about this group—getting to know new bloggers/blogs.  I had fun browsing through Anne’s blog to choose a recipe and finally chose Coconut Lime Mousse, which Anne also named “Heaven in a cup”.  Her mousse is made dairy free by using coconut milk and coconut juice along with a little raw sugar and lime zest and juice.  The mousse looks great and I’m sure I would like it as she made it, but for some reason every time I think of coconut, my mind always turns to joy first—Almond Joy.  AND—I don’t know why, but as I was making the mousse, I suddenly decided to freeze it in my ice cream maker and make ice cream.  I guess I just can’t help it.  Check out Anne’s recipe and her clever instruction for making coconut whipped cream!  I just might have to make more of this with the lime flavor—but I have a feeling I’ll still freeze it. ;)  Thanks, Anne—I love that this is healthier and very low in sugar.  I debated adding more sugar, but decided to just stick with the amount in the recipe and I’m glad I did because this was definitely sweet enough.  (I have a feeling the chocolate helped with that. ;)

Almond Joy Coconut Ice Cream (Dairy Free, Low Sugar), by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

1/4 cup sugar (I used some Zulka pure cane sugar from Mexico), or use raw sugar or even granulated sugar

1/4 cup cornstarch

1  1/2 cups coconut juice, (1 12 oz. can--I used Chaokon brand coconut juice with pulp

8 ounces (about 1/2 a can) of coconut milk whipped cream**

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

1/4 cup slivered almonds, toasted

1/8 cup mini chocolate chips or grated dark chocolate

Combine the sugar and cornstarch in a medium saucepan.  Gradually stir in the coconut juice and whisk constantly over medium heat until boiling.  Once boiling, continue and cook until thickened, 1-2 minutes.  Remove from the heat and whisk in the vanilla extract.  Put the mixture into a medium sized bowl.  Fill a large bowl with ice and water and set the bowl with the coconut mixture in the ice bath.  Stir every few minutes to begin cooling the mixture.  In the meantime, add the chilled skimmed coconut cream to the bowl of an electric mixer and beat it with the wire whisk attachment until it thickens like whipped cream, 3-5 minutes.  It will almost double in volume, but won’t be quite as thickened as heavy cream.

Gently fold the coconut whipped cream into the coconut mixture until well combined.  Chill in the ice bath until it feels very cold to the touch.  Pour mixture into the bowl of an ice cream maker and churn according to manufacturer’s instructions.  This took 15-20 minutes.  Put the coconut ice cream into an airtight container and freezer for a few hours.  Once frozen, let it sit on the counter for about 10 minutes.  Scoop into serving dishes and sprinkle on some shredded coconut, slivered almonds and grated dark chocolate.

**Chill the can of coconut milk in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours, this makes it so the cream thickens up on the top of the milk.  I chilled my can for a few days and almost 3/4 of the can of coconut milk was a thick cream that whipped up beautifully.  I scooped out about half the can to whip for this ice cream.

The ingredients, minus the cornstarch, which missed the photo shoot.

The chilled canned coconut milk (cream)

The whipped coconut cream

  Coconut Ice Cream!

With “the works”---Almond Joy Coconut Ice Cream!

Check out the rest of this month’s blog hop—this group is growing in numbers and this will continue to be fun, I’m sure!  If you’d like to join and have a yummy blog with lots of recipes to share, check out the details at Amanda's Cookin'.