Homemade Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream

If you like ice cream and if you like peanut butter than you will LOVE this homemade ice cream. It is creamy and rich, and loaded with Reese's peanut butter cups and toasted peanuts. And it is pretty easy to make although you will need an ice cream maker. If you don't have one, GET ONE! They are pretty affordable and a lot of fun to use. You can create endless flavors of ice cream adding things to a basic vanilla or chocolate recipe. My husband loves homemade ice cream and he requested that I make peanut butter ice cream for his birthday. So here it is! Warning...there are A LOT of pictures in this post...

Doesn't that look so good?

To start you will need a package of eight Reese's peanut butter cups, chopped into small chunks. Then place the chopped candy in the freezer while you make the ice cream.

Toast about 2/3rds of a cup of peanuts on a baking sheet for about 8 minutes at 350 degrees.

Chop your toasted peanuts and then add them to the chopped peanut butter cups in the freezer. Freezing your mix-ins is important for two reasons: one, it prevents them from breaking down even smaller in the ice cream maker and two, it helps keep the cool temperature of the mixed ice cream, allowing it to set up faster so you can EAT it faster. Next you will need a cup of cream peanut butter. A little trick to help the PB release easily from your measuring cup - spray the measuring cup with non-stick cooking spray first! Then it slides right out.

In a medium bowl, using a hand mixer on low speed, combine the peanut butter and 2/3 cup of granulated sugar until smooth.

Next, measure one cup of whole milk - making sure it is well chilled. I put my cup of milk in the freezer for about 10 minutes to get it nice and cold.

Add the cold milk to the peanut butter and sugar mixture and blend on low speed for about two minutes until smooth.

Next add 2 cups of heavy cream, also well chilled (again, placed in freezer for about 10 minutes) and 1 1/2 teaspoons of good vanilla extract. Please do not use imitation vanilla. It is gross and if you want to know why, just google to find out what it is make of or go here and read this. Use REAL vanilla extract, I promise it will make all the difference. And if you live near a Trader Joe's (which I sadly do not) it is pretty cheap. This is my favorite kind and I stock up on it on my few and far between trips to Trader Joe's. Okay, sorry for the soap box. Back to ice cream.

Once you have stirred in your heavy cream and vanilla it should look like this and the consistency will be thickened and very creamy.

Remove your ice cream freezer bowl from the freezer (I leave mine in my freezer so it is ready when I want to make ice cream but if you don't, you will need to make sure your freezer bowl has been in there for about 24 hours so it is nice and cold). Place the freezer bowl inside the ice cream maker and put the inside paddle in place and close the cover. Turn on and THEN pour in your mixture. I made the mistake of pouring in the mixture before I put the freezer bowl in which made it difficult to get the paddle just right. So don't do what I did.

Turn that bad boy on and let it go for about 20 minutes. Then add in your chopped toasted peanuts and peanut butter cups that have been chilling in the freezer while the machine is still running. If your mixture is too thick and they don't mix in well you can shut off the machine, transfer your ice cream to a freezer safe container and finish mixing in the nuts and candy with a wooden spoon. That is what I had to do. If your mixture is not too thick you can let the machine go for another 2-3 minutes to mix in the nuts and candy and then shut off and transfer to your freezer safe container.

Refrain yourself from eating this now, it isn't ready. You can taste it and be pretty pumped about how good it is. But why not make it even better?

How about swirling in some chocolate syrup????? Use a butter knife to swirl the chocolate in. Now we are really talking about some good ice cream. What goes better with peanut butter than chocolate?

I used about 1/4 cup of chocolate syrup. You can eye it and add as much or as little as you would like.

Cover and make sure your container is sealed and stick in the freezer for about 3-4 hours. It will be hard to wait. I know. But try. It is worth the wait.

After that incredibly long wait you are finally ready to scoop and eat. If your ice cream is too hard to scoop you can let it sit for about 5 minutes on the counter first. Can you see those peanut butter cups?

Creamy. Rich. Heavenly.

Don't eat too much, you will get a belly ache.

Recipe adapted from Cuisinart instruction and recipe booklet.