Quickie Flickie Ice Cream

My siblings and I are ice cream fanatics thanks to my dad who kept one of two deep freezers stocked with the stuff. Naturally I've passed that on to my own children. I don't have an extra freezer to devote to ice cream but at any given moment we have around 5 different half gallons of the stuff in a freezer somewhere. My dad was a HUGE fan of ice cream parties and Sunday night round table discussions that always included ice cream and possibly brownies, cookies, or cake (or even just the cake batter straight). I remember those nights when we'd make a tent in the living room out of blankets, put a few logs on the fire, whip up some shakes in the blender, turn out the lights and tell stories in the tent with our shakes. What great memories.

Shortly after Tyler and I got married, his dad pulled out their old ice cream machine from the shed and gifted it to us since they never used it. We got plenty of use out of it, so much that it finally gave up the ghost one summer evening and I sent Ty in a mad dash to Wal-Mart to purchase us another. I would have been deeply disturbed if this had happened in the winter when there are no ice cream machines to purchase. Thankfully he arrived with a bright, hot pink one in hand and we've been cranking out ice cream ever since (although I'm sure this one is going to lie down and die one day too, and I've been thinking I should have a spare just in case).

I've tried my share of ice cream recipes. I partial to good old vanilla. Raspberry shakes in the summer are fabulous, and as I sit here writing this I'm thinking of the 2 big buckets of raspberries in my freezer that we pulled off our bushes this year just waiting for something to be done with them . . . I believe raspberry shakes are somewhere in my near future. I also rather like Oreo. Like I've said I've come across several good recipes but they all tend to leave a coating in my mouth and freeze rock solid when the remainder is put in the freezer. My friend brought homemade ice cream to book club several months ago and I was in love. No coating!! I've made it several times now at home and love the texture, the taste, and it's not terribly hard when I pull it out of the freezer to "taste." It does include a few extra ingredients which often involves a trip to the store, but well worth it. 

QUICKIE FLICKIE ICE CREAM
1 pint heavy cream
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 small package vanilla instant pudding
1 quart whole milk
1 can evaporated milk
3/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons vanilla
candy mix of choice, optional

Combine all ingredients except candy in freezer. Stir until mixed. Churn until ice cream reaches a soft texture. Then add crushed candy and continue to churn until desired "freeze" level.