I hope you had a wonderful 4th of July or Canada Day! We went up to Lake Tahoe on the 3rd to see the fireworks at Kings Beach with a good friend. The 4th was actually a mellow day for us, so I decided to take advantage of the downtime and whip up a recipe that had been on my bucket list for a while, dairy-free Chocolate Chip Ice Cream without coconut! It’s adapted from the Purely Vanilla Ice Cream recipe in my flagship book, Go Dairy Free 2nd Edition.
It’s funny, but ice cream, not cheese, was my biggest fear when I went strictly dairy free. I refused to settle for sorbet, and wanted to enjoy sweet, creamy bliss just like everyone else. Over the years, some delicious dairy-free ice cream brands have emerged to keep my cravings at bay. But it wasn’t until I started making my own dairy-free ice cream that I finally found my food freedom.
Suddenly, it wasn’t about picking between the small selection of pints my local store carried, some with questionable ingredients. And “all natural” didn’t mean settling for just one type of base, with the same underlying flavor and consistency. Yeah, coconut, I’m talking about you. I love you, but vanilla coconut ice cream is never really vanilla. And although coconut cream delivers on richness, sometimes I want something a little less heavy.
At home, I can use a range of ice cream bases, and have total control over the ingredients. For this Chocolate Chip Ice Cream, I chose a simple unsweetened milk beverage and neutral-tasting oil to let the vanilla and chocolate shine. And to keep with the allergy-friendly and additive-free theme, I used Enjoy Life Mini Chocolate Chips. They’re certified vegan, non-GMO, made in a top allergen-free facility, and contain just cane sugar, natural chocolate liquor (non-alcoholic), and cocoa butter (yes, it’s dairy free!).
I actually use Enjoy Life chocolate almost exclusively in my baking, snacks, and treats. Although my milk allergy is no longer highly sensitive, I’ve still had symptoms from a few of the “may contain milk” chocolate brands. Rather than fret, I declare my food freedom by picking up a brand that I can trust.
And to help all of you eat freely, I’ve made this Chocolate Chip Ice Cream recipe completely vegan, coconut-free, and top 11 allergen-free. The base is even quite flexible. You can use your favorite milk beverage and choose the oil based on your flavor and nutrition choices. So grab some gluten-free cones and get scooping. It’s time to enjoy a taste of food freedom on this hot summer day.
Thanks to Enjoy Life Foods for sponsoring this post, and helping so many of us enjoy our food freedom. You can #EatFreely with them on Instagram and Twitter. As always, the honest opinions, stories, photos, recipe, and product love are my own.
Special Diet Notes: Dairy-Free Chocolate Chip Ice Cream
By ingredients, this recipe is dairy-free / non-dairy, coconut-free, egg-free, gluten-free, grain-free, nut-free, peanut-free, soy-free, vegan, vegetarian, and top food allergy-friendly.
Dairy-Free Chocolate Chip Ice Cream
Ingredients
Method
- Put the milk beverage and sugar in your blender. Blend until the sugar dissolves, about 1 minute.
- With the motor running, very slowly drizzle in the oil. Continue to blend until creamy and emulsified, about 1 minute.
- Add the vanilla and salt and blend briefly to combine.
- Churn the mixture in your prepared ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions or use one of these methods. If churning, it will take longer than coconut-based ice cream since there is very little saturated fat in this blend. Expect at least 45 minutes.
- During the last few minutes of churning, add the chocolate chips. They will stir in as they churn.
- Pack the soft ice cream into a chilled, freezer-safe container and freeze for 4 hours for a soft-set ice cream or overnight for hard-packed ice cream.
Nutrition
Notes
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94 Comments
Just tried this with cashew milk and it didn’t turn out. It’s icy and won’t scoop. I couldn’t get the oil to emulsify. Help
Hi Shannon, so you churned it before it was emulsified? I use pea protein milk because it is an emulsified type beverage already, so it easily emulsifies with more oil. Not all milk beverages will emulsify well (it really depends on the brand and type), and you do need the mixture to emulsify before you churn it. It won’t emulsify in the churning process. You can let your current mixture melt and then emulsify it before churning again. Since you are obviously okay with cashews, you might want to enrich it with a little ground cashews or cashew butter. This can help in the process. Lecithin is an emulsifier, which you can buy at supplement stores or online, which you can use in very small amounts, if needed. Egg yolk is another natural emulsifier.
I love it! This will be my go-to for homemade ice cream. I didn’t have an ice cream maker, so I froze the custard into ice cubes then put the ice cubes in the food processor. Works wonders.
That’s great! I’m glad this recipe worked so well without an ice cream maker for you.
Have you tried this with Oak milk? My husband bought me an ice cream maker for our anniversary. I have oak milk in the fridge right now.
I have not! Please do let me know if you try it.
Wow, amazing recipe, my kids love choco chips icecream, looking forward to making it tomorrow
I hope you love it!
ALSO: Can I use tapioca starch as a thickening agent in this recipe? I’m allergic to xantham and guar gum and corn starch. Thank you!
Are you asking about this particular recipe? It doesn’t use any gum. If you opt to use a starch to thicken, you will need to cook (and then cool) to “activate” the starch.
Yes I am referring to this recipe. I saw in another comment here that you tinkered with the recipe and used xantham gum to thicken so I was just curious about using tapioca starch.
Oh yes! The recipe in my book uses xanthan gum. This makes it creamier since it binds it. I also have a recipe in the book (Go Dairy Free) using starch, but it is a chocolate recipe. It makes more of a pudding-style ice cream, which is still delicious. But you do need to cook it, like a pudding, first. You can certainly try that – good odds it will work out.
If I do choose to use the tapioca starch, how much do I use and how do I cook it first? Add to water? if so how much? I will first try your recipe as is, but then modify next batches if needed. But if my first batch turns out well using your recipe as is, then I won’t be changing it =)
That really is getting into a whole other recipe, so I couldn’t advise. My chocolate recipe has cocoa powder in it too, which changes the ratios quite a bit.
This is the best recipe I have found with ALL my food allergies and restrictions, it’s the only recipe I could find that I know I could make safely. The only dairy free milk I could consume safely is rice milk. Do you think this recipe would work well with rice milk since there’s also oil to help with the fat content, and hopefully help with the creaminess??!! I plan to make the following flavors: Vanilla with choc chip and pecan, matcha green tea ice cream. How much matcha powder do you think I could ask to THIS recipe? Maybe 2 tsp? Thanks for any input! I haven’t had any ice cream for over 2 years now since following my strict allergy free diet. I just ordered an ice cream maker online today and with the quarantine, this all couldn’t come at a better time! I’m so excited!
You can use rice milk, but it will be a little closer to ice milk – still creamy, just not super creamy. As for matcha, I would personally start with 1 teaspoon, taste, and blend in more matcha to taste. You can adjust as you go pretty easily.
Okay, I’m sure it will still be good. Should I add a little more oil, would that help? Or keep the recipe as is?
I would try the recipe as is, then tinker with it on future batches. Once you try it, you can get a feel for any changes you might like. I’d make more suggestions, but I’m not sure what your food restrictions are.
I have lots of allergies. What suggestions do you have, and I’ll see if I can incorporate them or not =) ??
Rather than adding more oil, I was going to suggest you try adding a little bit of a fat that adds more body, like a little ripe avocado. It will color the recipe slightly, but if you just use a little, it shouldn’t affect the flavor notably. I’d try maybe 1/4 cup blended in. Avocado is a natural emulsifier, and has pudding-like properties. I’ve made ice cream recipes with it with good success.
Good call on the avocado! I had a friend recently suggest that to me actually! So, I just follow your recipe as is and then add in the avocado in addition to everything, correct? Do I mash the avocado up first or just scoop it and put it right into the ice cream maker once all ingredients are already churning?
I would mash it, measure it, and then throw it in the blender with the other ingredients – blend until smooth. That small of an amount shouldn’t take away from the sweetness much. You can taste test and tweak before churning if needed. Keep in mind that the mixture will taste a little less sweet once frozen.
YUM! Thank you Alisa for all the input! Because of all my food restrictions, I really rely on the internet to help me figure out alternatives so I can still enjoy my favorite foods in a safer way! Im really excited to try this! Since the avocado may lighten the sweetness a bit, I may add a little more sugar to the recipe to offset that. I will let you know how it goes! By the way, after ordering my ice cream maker online yesterday morning, shortly after, it was all sold out! So it was good timing for me to order and good timing finding this awesome recipe. Thanks again!
I’m happy to help! And definitely let me know how it goes. I’m happy to help you troubleshoot to get it just right 🙂
I definitely will let you know how it goes! Thank you!! I forgot to ask, will the addition of the avocado make the ice cream brown at all? I can’t add lemon or anything like that to preserve it because I’m allergic.
It might change the hue a little (greenish tint at first, likely tan when frozen a little while) but it’s perfectly fine.
Thanks a lot for sharing this yummy Ice Cream recipe with all of us. Loved it so much. Regards
I’m not sure what you mean by grease – this isn’t greasy. If you look at the ingredients for many ice cream alternatives, particularly those that aren’t made with full fat coconut milk or cream, they do contain oil. And this is actually not a high fat recipe. What you are doing is creating an emulsion – a very common technique in making all types of popular creamy foods. If you can’t use oil, you might want to try one of the coconut milk based ice cream recipes that I have posted here. If you can’t do fat, then sorbets are a better route. You can freeze a rich milk beverage, but it will be ice milk – not creamy.
Do I have to use an oil? That honestly sounds kinda gross and I can’t eat a lot of grease/oil due to not having a gallbladder…
I made this twice already! And while it doesn’t have the thick creamy consistency of real dairy ice-cream, the taste is delicious and refreshing in a way that ice cream isn’t. I can’t have dairy anymore because my nursing baby has severe allergies to it – thank you for the simple and adaptable recipe!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it Jackie and thank you for your feedback!
This is so good! I’ve made it 3-4 times so far. I am dairy free and recently found out I can’t have coconut, so this recipe is perfect. I use stevia to sweeten, since I use a combination of unsweetened, vanilla and chocolate pea milk. It already had sugar in the flavored milk. Thank you!!
So glad you are enjoying the recipe Jill, and thank you for sharing your low sugar version!