Peanut Butter Ice Cream with Peanut Butter Sauce

I'm genetically predisposed for addiction to ice cream.  It might be why I'm also genetically predisposed to diabetes, but that's another story.  My dad passed down his love of this stuff to me, I passed it down to my children.  We're generous in our family that way.

I also married a man from the Ice Cream Capital of the World.  I don't think that's a coincidence.

For those of you who share my love, and who fondly remember hot summer days with a very loud ice cream machine being tended by someone with a bag of ice and rock salt, I urge you to invest in an ice cream maker with a freezer bowl like this one from Cuisinart.  It is life changing.  Homemade ice cream in 25 minutes.  No salt.  No ice.  A little noise. 

There are all kinds of different ways to make ice cream, but I'm going to share the hands-down-easiest one.  Ever.  Though it's great on its own, we've been known to dress it up in all sorts of fun ways--chocolate and Andes peppermint bark at Christmas, Thin Mint at Girl Scout time, cinnamon to go with pie in the fall.....  You're limited only by your creative sweet tooth.  After a recent trip to the grocery store where I spied a bag of Dark Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, I was inspired to create a peanut butter ice cream, with peanut butter sauce, and chopped peanut butter cups.  It's naughty.  If you're a food journal fanatic like me, you may need to commit to an entire day of raw vegetables and light string cheese in order to have just a half cup.  But oh my.  It's worth it.

Ready?  That's it.  That's all you're going to need for an ice cream base.  No eggs.  No cooking.  It's stupid easy.  

Just pour that creamy loveliness into your ice cream freezer and set your timer for 20-25 minutes.

Tip: I've found ice cream comes out of the ice cream freezer more easily if you lightly spray it with Pam (or whatever) cooking spray.  I know that sounds gross, and you don't have to, but it prevents the ice cream from sticking so tightly to the sides.  My machine takes about 20 minutes to change the base to soft-serve ice cream.  While you wait for that to happen, you can prepare anything you want to add into your ice cream.  Dark chocolate and peanut butter.  Yum-ma.

I add anything I'm going to add after my machine has run for 20 minutes, and let it mix 5 more minutes after I add stuff in.

Here's another important tip.  If you're going to make ice cream with any regularity, buy a glass dish with a lid and keep it in the freezer at all times--even when it's empty.  If you don't, as soon as you pour your ice cream into the dish it's going to start melting back to the base, and it will be a soupy mess.  

Assembly time.  My peanut butter sauce was smooth and cooled down.  And the smell of it made my children refuse to leave the kitchen area, dancing around in anticipation.  Some licking of spoons did occur at the end of this project.  

I just layered ice cream with some sauce, then ice cream with some sauce, then ice cream.

Then I put the lid on that loveliness and put it into my freezer to let it all firm up.  Waiting is the hardest part, right?

But oh my, the wait is worth it.  Though we tend to like generous bowls of ice cream, a little of this kind goes a long way.  It's rich.  It's peanut buttery.  It's chocolate chunky.  Mmmm hmmmm.

If you want to be just ridiculous and send it over the top, pull out any extra peanut butter sauce and warm it up.  Then pour some on top.

If you just want to go plain crazy, chop up another peanut butter cup to sprinkle on top of that.  Prepare to feel gluttonous.  In the best possible way.

Peanut Butter Ice Cream with Peanut Butter Sauce

For ice cream base:
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 pint half and half
1 pint heavy cream
1/2 to 1 cup of peanut butter (depending on your preference)
1/2 to 1 bag of peanut butter cups (personal preference)

For peanut butter sauce
1 c sugar
1 c corn syrup (I know! Awful, right?)
1 c milk
1 c peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla

Prepare the peanut butter sauce first, because it requires boiling and cooling before it can be layered with the ice cream.  Note that the recipe for the sauce makes enough for the ice cream and about a pint of extra sauce for pouring.  Cut the recipe in half if you do not want as much extra.  In a saucepan, whisk sugar, corn syrup and milk until well blended.  Raise the mixture to 220 degrees, whisking often.  Remove from heat, and whisk in the peanut butter and vanilla.  Allow the mixture to cool--put it in the refrigerator or even the freezer if you need to speed that process along.  Be certain the sauce is still pourable; don't let it freezer or harden.

For the ice cream base, whisk the half and half, heavy cream, sweetened condensed milk, vanilla and peanut butter in a pitcher.  Use your ice cream freezer as directed.  For a freezer similar to mine, wait to take the freezer cylinder out of the freezer until you are ready to pour the ice cream base in.  Set your timer for 20 minutes.  While the base is freezing in the machine, chop up the peanut butter cups.  I used about 3/4 of a bag, but you might prefer more or less.  After the ice cream has frozen for 20 minutes, add the chopped candy and allow to freeze for another 5 minutes.

Remove your clean glass ice cream container from the freezer.  Scoop about a third of the ice cream from the freezer and spread at the bottom of the container.  Pour as much peanut butter sauce as desired on top--a small amount if you want a 'ripple', more if you want very rich ice cream.  Top with another third of the ice cream, spreading the ice cream around so it covers the peanut butter sauce, then add more peanut butter sauce on top.  Finish by spreading the final third of the ice cream on top.  Place a lid on the container, and put the ice cream into the freezer for as long as you can wait.  I would recommend at least an hour so it all hardens.  When you're ready, scoop into containers and top if desired.  Decadent!