I’ve eaten homemade vanilla ice cream before, but this is the greatest. It has an unbeatable creamy, buttery flavor because to the honey and brown sugar.
| Prep Time: | 4 hrs 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 15 mins |
| Total Time: | 4 hrs 30 mins |
| Servings: | 12 |
| Yield: | 1 1/2 quarts |
Ingredients
- 2 cups milk
- 1 (7 inch) vanilla bean, split lengthwise
- 6 egg yolks
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 3 tablespoons honey
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 cups heavy cream
Instructions
- In a medium pan, heat the milk and vanilla bean to simmering. Do not boil. In a mixing bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, brown sugar, honey, and salt until light colored and frothy. While whisking constantly, slowly combine the hot milk with the egg mixture. Transfer the mixture back to the sauce pan. Cook over medium heat until mixture reaches 180 degrees Fahrenheit (82 degrees Celsius) when tested with a candy thermometer, or becomes thick enough to coat the back of a metal spoon. Remove from heat.
- Remove the vanilla bean from the mixture and reserve. Strain custard into a large bowl. Scrape seeds from the vanilla bean into the custard. (Vanilla bean pod may be used again.) Stir the heavy cream into the custard. Cover the surface of the custard with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 4 hours.
- When cold, freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions.
- You can substitute 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract if you don’t have a vanilla bean in your pantry. Add the vanilla extract to the custard mixture with the heavy cream.
Reviews
I used golden lakanto (monkfruit/erythritol blend) for the brown sugar due to a health issue in the family, but I did use real honey and this recipe was a winner! It also doesn’t get rock hard like other sugar free ice creams I’ve made, so my guess is that’s because of the honey.
Way too sweet.
I love this recipe I think cooked ice cream recipes taste more complex and richer than the recipes that you do not cook. this is on our heavy rotation.
This was the best vanilla ice cream I’ve ever had. I used a darker natural honey and it came out with a light almost caramel flavour with the vanilla. Everyone raved about it. I will use this recipe again for sure!
My family and I devoured this. It was wonderful. Not too sweet , I used dark brown sugar so color was more Carmel, but taste was spot-on. Will make again
Love the hint of honey.
Absolutely the BEST ice cream recipe I’ve had in a long time. It was a little strange looking ( foamy) before it was frozen but came out perfect. I poured the cooked mixture into a shallow pan and put it in the freezer for 30 minutes to cool instead of the fridge for 4 hours. Worked fine.
We have made this twice already and loved it! The first time we didn’t have brown sugar so we used white, it was good but a little too sweet. The next time we used brown and about 3/4 of a cup and it was absolutely delicious! I still think that I will the amount of sugar called for next time!
I used Madagascar Pure Vanilla Extract, instead of the vanilla bean.
This is great, I use Erythritol and make it sugar free and nobody can tell the difference. I use Vanilla extract and sometimes add a little fruit. Of all the recipes I have tired to substitute as sugar free this one seems to work the best.
Delicious! I used 1.5 tablespoons pure vanilla extract in place of the vanilla bean and hslf and half in place of whole milk… after tasting the final product decided it’d be even more delicious with toasted pecans. This is my new favorite vanilla ice cream recipe! Thank you so much for sharing.
I made this exactly as the recipe stated. It was wonderful. Next time I will add more honey. The brown sugar gave it a rich flavor, but I wanted to taste more honey. I think I may add toasted pecans or sweetened granola next time. But alone, it was very yummy.
really good. loved it
We liked this ice cream. We made it with pure vanilla instead of the bean. I think some lemon zest would be amazing too.
This is my second try with making homemade ice cream and my first time using the recipe. It turned out great! It was so creamy and I could taste the honey but it wasn’t overwhelming. I didn’t have vanilla beans so I just used pure vanilla extract. Other than that, I followed the recipe exactly. I did let it sit in the fridge overnight before putting it in the machine. I don’t eat vanilla ice cream but I would definitely eat this one.
This is the best ice cream I’ve ever made. It deserves to be in a category all by itself because plain vanilla just does not compare.
You can really taste the vanilla and honey. I love the real vanilla beans in it. Very easy to make .
We make cinnamon ice cream for the 4th of July and I was looking for a good base recipe. I added 3 tsp of ceylon cinnamon and it was delicious! My family did not find this too sweet, but that may be a difference in different regional honeys (ie. clover, orange blossom, mesquite).
Used whole eggs and vanilla extract.
Love this vanilla ice cream. I didn’t scrape the seeds from my vanilla bean since I was adding diced frozen fruit. This is my new go-to ice cream.
holy I used coconut sugar instead of brown and it came out very rich and caramel flavored, and colored. Also I used my own free range eggs, so it came out looking golden. Next time I will reduce the cream by half because I only churned it the minimum amount and it still came out just a little too buttery/fatty.