Simple & Pure Vanilla Ice Cream Recipe

Vanilla Ice Cream. Just the way it should be. Delightful.

It was topped with colored sprinkles, my favorite ice cream topping. Hot fudge was on my agenda, but I was too lazy to make it.

As I was taking this picture, my first thought was to add some sprinkles to the ice cream, which made me think of the TCBY Shivers I ate in high school. This is precisely how I will make ice cream next time.

There is nothing easier than this custard-based ice cream recipe, and it only requires a few steps to prepare. My vanilla ice cream recipe involves steeping one vanilla bean in a mixture of whole milk and heavy cream, then tempering the hot milk into the egg yolks and sugar, then cooking it until it thickens and registers between 170-180F. Before churning the mixture, I let it sit in the fridge for 6 hours.

A day in the freezer mellowed the vanilla flavor nicely, and the ice cream had the perfect, consistent balance of hardness and softness.

I don’t know what to do with a quart of this stuff. It’s challenging to give away in the office, and I hate exercising too much to keep such delicious sweets in the house.