Black Walnut Ice Cream – A Simple No-Churn Treat

Who doesn’t love ice cream on a hot summer day? This flavorful black walnut ice cream is a unique and sophisticated twist on plain vanilla that you won’t soon forget!

What does a black walnut taste like?

These black walnuts taste quite different from the more common English walnuts you may be familiar with. In some ways, they do taste like a stronger, more flavorful version, particularly if you eat the skins.

However, they also have a bit of a pungent, somewhat bitter, and almost citrusy flavor in addition that is a great contrast to all the sweetness in the ice cream. Many people describe them as earthy.

Black walnuts are native to about 15 states in the Midwest and parts of the South in the US. Some who live there associate the taste of black walnuts with fall (or autumn, for those of you across the pond).

People add them to coffee cakes, cookies, Thanksgiving dressing, and, of course, ice cream.

You can read a rather evocative rumination on black walnuts in this article from NPR to get a sense of the emotional pull of these nuts for those who grew up eating them.

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What is no-churn ice cream?

This simply means that you don’t need an ice cream maker to make this recipe. An ice cream machine will churn ice cream for you, usually in a pre-chilled bowl.

Since this is not a traditional custard ice cream recipe with eggs, this is unnecessary for our purposes: a quick and easy homemade ice cream with minimal equipment and ingredients!

Black walnut ice cream ingredients

Before you begin, you will need:

Edible Ingredients

• 1 pint (2 cups) of light cream (table cream)
• 1 14 ounce can of sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 cup chopped black walnuts
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Tools

• A hand mixer and bowl, stand mixer, or a blender
• Measuring cups and spoons
• A can opener
• A spatula for the sweetened condensed milk
• A container to freeze your ice cream in – many people use bread loaf pans, but I just used a plastic Ziploc tub
• Parchment paper (optional but may make your clean up easier)
• Access to a freezer

How to make no-churn black walnut ice cream

1. To begin, pour your light cream into a mixing bowl.
2. Then, open the sweetened condensed milk and scoop it into the bowl with a spatula.
3. After that, measure out your vanilla extract and pour that in with everything else.
4. Next, mix all the ingredients together with a hand mixer, stand mixer, or dump everything in a blender and blend. Since we used light cream, it won’t whip up into peaks, but we just need some air bubbles in there so our ice cream is light and fluffy.
5. Once the ice cream base is combined, stir in the black walnuts until evenly distributed.
6. When the mixture is ready, you can line your freezer container with parchment paper for easier clean up, or you can just pour it all directly into whatever container you will be freezing your ice cream in.
7. Finally, cover and place in the freezer for 4 hours or overnight. Let stand a few minutes before serving. Garnish with extra black walnuts, caramel sauce, or whatever toppings you’d like. Enjoy!

Make it vegan

Yes, vegan friends, you can duplicate this recipe with coconut products! Use two cups of coconut cream (the solid stuff in canned coconut milk) for the base. Next, some brands make canned sweetened condensed coconut milk. Check your local grocery store, or you can get some from Amazon.

I think a bit of coconut flavor would not go amiss with black walnuts.

Variations on this black walnut ice cream recipe

Many people make a similar ice cream base using heavy whipping cream instead of light table cream. This will yield a richer, creamier ice cream without any of the ice crystals you get using light cream. It scoops out very easily.

However, that method is quite rich, so you might need smaller portions. In addition, some people report a buttery coating in their mouth after eating it, so I opted against it.

For a lower fat version, you could use any kind of milk you’d like: whole, 2%, skim, coconut, etc. The less fat in the ice cream, the harder it will be to scoop out and the more ice crystals you will have. With lower fat ice cream, you’ll probably need to let it sit out for a few minutes so you can scoop it.

If you want less sugar in your ice cream, try using only half of the can of sweetened condensed milk. You could also use half evaporated milk and half sweetened condensed milk.

For a richer flavor, you could saute the black walnuts in butter first, or even toast them in the oven before adding them to the ice cream.

In addition, you could heat the cream and the black walnuts together over the stove to infuse the black walnut flavor throughout the ice cream.

If you can’t find black walnuts, you could also use black walnut extract. I found my black walnuts at Walmart.

Maple syrup would complement the black walnut flavor nicely, as would honey.

Other no-churn ice cream flavors and add ins

Once you have the base of this dish down – the cream, sweetened condensed milk, and vanilla – you can make it any flavor you’d like.

Add in fresh fruit like bananas, strawberries, peaches, blueberries, cherries, etc. with or without other toppings like peanut butter, caramel, chocolate chips, or whatever you’d like.

You could make a decadent dessert by crushing cookies or graham crackers and adding them in, or adding marshmallows, fresh mint or mint extract, or any flavor combination you can dream up!

Lavender lemon? Strawberry rose? Why not? You could either include dried flower petals or buds, or you could make a flavored syrup to add a floral note to your dessert.

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Related dessert article

Once you start making homemade ice cream, you may need homemade raspberry Melba sauce to go on top!

I hope you enjoyed this no-churn black walnut ice cream recipe!