Irish Coffee Ice Cream

My taste is pretty simple when it comes to ice cream.  Vanilla is my favorite and if that's not available, I'll take chocolate.  The most exotic I get with ice cream flavors is coffee.  It reminds me of being eight years old and tracking across town with my mom.  I can distinctly recall driving down a major highway, as there were tons of towering light poles shining down, towards a store where she would pick up a gallon of ice cream to last her a while and the children each picked out a single serving for themselves.  I would frequently get the coffee.

I don't often buy coffee ice cream because I would eat just about all of it; my children don't share my taste, but thankfully my husband does.  The problem is I really like the more expensive brands of ice cream when it comes to coffee, like Haagen Dazs.  One night we were sitting around the table enjoying our ice cream when my son {or perhaps my husband} said, "I wonder what Haagen Dazs means."  I was intrigued and grabbed a laptop and googled it.  Guess what?  It doesn't mean anything.  It's not even Danish!  I thought it meant something like 'Happy Days'.  I also found out that my favorite coffee ice cream isn't from Denmark.  A Polish imigrant came up with the idea after sitting around for days making goofy sounds that he thought sounded Danish.  Go figure.  I then shared my disappointment with my family over Haagen Dazs being from New York rather than from Denmark, explaining that as a young teenager I only liked it because it was from Copenhagen.  It even had a map of Denmark with Copenhagen starred.  That's official, right?!

Back to my ice cream.  A blogging friend, Monica, posted a recipe for peppermint ice cream.  Not only does it make brilliant use of candy canes, it requires no ice cream maker, just use your stand mixer to whip up the ingredients.  I love the idea of not using an ice cream make and making fresh ice cream, that has real cream in it.  I was so excited that I even got somewhat exotic with my flavoring~ Irish cream mixed with coffee.  Just in time for St. Patrick's Day.  How festive!

Irish Coffee Ice Cream
based on recipe from Sweet Peas and Happy Things
2 c heavy whipping cream
1/2  c whole milk
1/4 c Irish cream
1/4 c brown sugar
2 tbsp instant coffee granules

Combine all ingredients and stir to help coffee and sugar dissolve.  Pour into the bowl of a stand mixer {there may be some bits of sugar and coffee at the bottom, that's fine, they will get mixed as the cream is whipped}.  Using the whisk attachment, whip ingredients until fluffy but not stiff {about 7~10 minutes}, beginning on low speed and moving to medium as mixture thickens.  Place ingredients in freezer appropriate container and freeze for 8~12 hours.  Makes about 2 quarts of ice cream.

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