Homemade Single Serve Ice Cream in 5 Minutes!

When I was 15, my first job was at an ice cream store called, "Treat Street." Some of my friends worked there, I loved ice cream, and it was air conditioned in the summer -- what more could you want? Ever since then, I've had a slight addiction to ice cream. I've never made it myself (why make it when there's Ben & Jerry's in the world?) but when I saw this post from DoItDarling, it seemed too good to pass up. C'mon, ice cream in 5 minutes? I put it to the test.



To make these you'll need:

1/2 cup of milk (cream or half and half work too)
1 Tablespoon of sugar
1/4 teaspoon of vanilla (I made mine here)
6 Tablespoons of kosher salt
12-24 ice cubes
1 gallon-sized Ziploc bag
1 pint-sized (or sandwich-sized) Ziploc bag

Start by adding your milk to the pint or sandwich-sized Ziploc bag.

And then add your sugar and vanilla. If you want to make chocolate ice cream, now would be the time to add chocolate syrup and seal it up tight!

In your gallon-sized bag, add your kosher salt.

Stick the smaller bag with the milk, sugar, and vanilla inside the larger bag and add enough ice cubes to fill up half of the bag in ice (I used 24 ice cubes - 2 trays - and it worked out just fine).

Now seal up the bigger bag and shake vigorously for 5 minutes. Some tips?

   #1 - Wear oven mitts. The bag is going to get cold and slippery because of the condensation

   #2 - Shake over the sink. During the last minute, my bag tore and I was shaking salty water everywhere!

After the 5 minutes are up, take out the small bag. From the outside, it might not look like ice cream...

But from the inside, you'll see it is! Ice cream for one, please!

While I was adding the milk, sugar, and vanilla to the smaller bag, I also added some peppermint extract (1/2 teaspoon was way too much, by the way!) but it did give it a nice minty flavor. I also added some mini chocolate chips because who doesn't like a nice topping with their ice cream? I wouldn't say it's enough for two but it is just enough if you have a sweet tooth!

TOTAL COSTS: About $18.50 (if you don't have any of the ingredients, prices from Vons)

$2.29 for milk
$2.69 for sugar
$4.99 for store-bought vanilla
$3.49 for kosher salt
$2.99 for a box of gallon-sized Ziploc bags
$2.09 for a box of sandwich Ziploc bags
I would hope you have ice cubes in your freezer!

TOTAL AMOUNT OF TIME: 10 minutes 

5 minutes adding all the ingredients together

5 minutes of shaking the bag

EASY-PEASY SCALE (1 super easy - 5 very difficult): 2 out of 5

The shaking is a really good workout for your arms so if you're just getting out of the hospital or you did 100 pushups yesterday and you can't raise your arms above your head, this might not be the project for you. However, if you don't mind shakin' what your mama gave you, the ice cream is a nice treat after the workout you'll be getting!

Origami Plastic Bags

Lately, my cupboard has been taken over by a big, white, plastic bag monster who likes to eat other plastic bags. It grows and grows until the shelves are overflowing. Some people have those bags for holding plastic bags but I never saw one I liked. Then I saw a post on Pinterest that suggested putting them in an old Kleenex box. That's a good idea... unless you have over 50, in which case, you need a lot of boxes. Then I came across this post by MouseChirpy and thought it was brilliant - origami plastic bags! Gosh I love the internet!

First, flatten out your plastic bag (including the handles). Fold it in half length-wise, then fold it in half again.

   

Next, fold a corner up from the bottom and into a triangle.

Continue to fold, making the triangles, until you've reached the handles.

   fold fold fold fold fold until.... here:

Now fold down the handles from the top until they're only 1/2" to 1" long.

I found it was easiest to take the top corners of the handles and fold them in so the center made a point.

Take that point and tuck it inside the folded layers.

And there you have it kids! An easy way to store a bunch of plastic bags so you can finally use those Kleenex boxes for something else... like Kleenex!

TOTAL COSTS: Free!

TOTAL AMOUNT OF TIME: 1 minute/bag

EASY PEASY SCALE (1 super easy - 5 very difficult): 2 out of 5
It takes a second to get into the flow of it (coming from someone who never made paper footballs in school) but once you get into it, it's a piece 'o cake and they definitely cut down on valuable space!