Ever since my mother gave me an ice cream maker for my birthday a couple years back, I’ve been experimenting with ice cream recipes in an ongoing quest to avoid paying absurd post-Covid prices on the little shrinky-dink ice cream containers at the grocery store (remember when the normal size of an ice cream container was a half gallon? Yeah, I barely do, either). However, one ice cream I’ve never found a good homemade alternative for has remained elusive: chocolate chip cookie dough.

The problem, of course, is the cookie dough chunks. Sure, there are recipes for this, but they all seemed like way too much work for way too little (and off-tasting) payoff. But then, an epiphany! What if I made ice cream where the ice cream itself tasted like chocolate chip cookie dough?

Turns out, that’s super easy to do! In fact, I accomplished it in a single attempt. This is hands-down my favorite homemade ice cream, and if you have an ice cream machine I strongly recommend you try a batch!

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 cup milk (whole milk preferred, but works with lower-fat milk if you use a higher fat heavy cream)
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed (the darker the better)
• Pinch salt (optional)
• Pinch ground nutmeg (optional)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla paste or extract
• ~1 cup miniature chocolate chips (prefer “natural” ones over something like Nestle; the more non-chocolate ingredients they have, the waxier the texture)

Method

Heat both sugars, optional salt, and 1 cup heavy cream over medium low heat until sugar is fully dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla paste, optional nutmeg, remaining heavy cream, and milk. If you are using an ice cream machine with a built-in compressor, you can immediately start churning it. Otherwise, chill in fridge before churning.

Stir in mini chocolate chips near the end of the churn (usually within the last 5-10 minutes). Move to storage container and freeze for 12-24 hours for best consistency.

Enjoy! You might want to make a double batch, because every time I’ve made this it has disappeared shortly after someone takes their first spoonful.