5 Things You Should Never Do When Making Banana Ice Cream

This summer we think you should give banana ice cream, also known as nice cream, a try. Why? Well, for one it’s the easiest freezer treat that you can make without an ice cream maker. Nice cream is also full of fruit, easily customizable, and so dang delicious you’ll be eating it for breakfast too.

Banana ice cream is pretty easy — freeze some sliced bananas, whirl them in a food processor, and enjoy right away or freeze for later — but there are just a few key steps that make the difference between very good banana ice cream and sad banana ice cream. Never do these five things and you’ll have a summer full of delectable nice cream from your freezer.

When you’ve got one ingredient to rely on for a recipe, you want to make sure that one ingredient is the best it can be. For one-ingredient banana ice cream, the ideal bananas are perfectly ripe — no green starchy bananas and no super-soft and sweet bananas will do. Look for yellow bananas with just a few small brown spots for peeling, slicing, and freezing.

Maybe this seems kind of obvious, but you don’t want to freeze the peeled bananas whole. Sliced bananas process faster, meaning they’ll become ice cream with less mixing.

The bananas for banana ice cream must be frozen — try puréeing bananas and then freezing them and you’ll be disappointed with starchy, gooey icicles. Freeze the banana slices first and then process quickly for creamy, dreamy nice cream.

A food processor is the absolute best tool for making banana ice cream. Yes, technically you can use a high-powered blender (make sure to slice the bananas even smaller before freezing if you go this route!), but you really should use the food processor if you have one.

Bananas have a fair amount of starch, and over-processing the banana ice cream will make it gooey instead of creamy. So how do you know when your ice cream is done? Just after the last bit of banana chunk has disappeared, blend for just 30 seconds more.