No Churn Cherry Garcia Ice Cream

No churn ice cream is the way to go when you want to make ice cream in a hurry but don’t have an ice cream maker. The base is made with sweetened condensed milk and lightened with whipped cream, which gives the finished ice cream a texture that is similar to that of regular ice cream with a lot less work. You can also add quite a few other flavors to the ice cream base to create a wide variety of ice cream flavors. This No Churn Cherry Garcia Ice Cream is the perfect choice if you’re a fan of the Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia ice cream flavor.

This starts out with a vanilla ice cream base, and both sweet cherries and chocolate chips are added to replicate that Cherry Garcia flavor. You can use either fresh cherries or jarred cherries in this ice cream. Fresh cherries will have a slightly firmer texture, while jarred cherries will be a little bit softer. Both will deliver a good cherry flavor, although the jarred cherries have the advantage that they are available for use year-round. Don’t use cherry pie filling or you’ll end up with a cherry ice cream instead of cherries in ice cream!

Instead of using full size chocolate chips, which get so hard that they’re difficult to bite into when frozen, I prefer to use finely chopped chocolate (pieces slightly larger than chocolate shavings) in ice cream. They get more evenly distributed, so you get some chocolate in every bite, but they aren’t large enough to pose a chewing hazard when frozen.

You could pour this base into your ice cream maker if you have one, but there is no need to churn it. Once the base is made, you simply need to freeze it for a couple of hours until it firms up enough to be scoopable and you can enjoy homemade ice cream any time.

No Churn Cherry Garcia Ice Cream
14-oz sweetened condensed milk
1 tbsp vanilla extract
2 cups heavy cream, cold
2 cups sweet cherries, fresh or jarred.
4 oz dark chocolate, finely chopped

In a large bowl, whisk together sweetened condensed milk and vanilla extract.
In a medium bowl, whip heavy cream to stiff peaks. Fold in to sweetened condensed milk.
If using fresh cherries, pit them and coarsely chop them. If using jarred cherries, drain them and coarsely chop them.
Fold cherries and chocolate into the ice cream base and transfer to a loaf pan or other freezer-safe container, cover and freeze until firm and scoopable, approx 2-4 hours.