Banana Chai Ice Cream
This dairy free ice cream, flavored with chai spices, doesn’t require an ice cream machine or patience. It’s perfect for appeasing your instant gratification dessert cravings.
If you peruse Pinterest or the health-food-blog-scene, then you are most likely familiar with pure banana ice cream. This treat requires only frozen bananas and a blender or food processor to create a creamy, naturally sweet, “I can’t believe it’s not dairy!” result.
I like including a few special additions to my blender banana ice cream for a rich and exotic result. First, I add sunflower seed butter for creamy richness and to slow the absorption of the natural sugars. It also offers a chai color and complements the spices. Of course, you can use whatever nut butter you want. I would suggest cashew or almond butter, but not peanut butter (of which I’m not a fan plus the taste isn’t right here). Next, I include a few spices for the chai flavor.
Then something magical happens. The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. Banana, nut butter and spices suddenly turn into a cause for celebration!
- 1 large, very ripe bananas, frozen
- 1 Tbs. nut or seed butter of choice (almond, sunflower seed, cashew...)
- ¼ tsp. cinnamon
- ⅛ tsp. each: cardamom and ground ginger
- Pinch of salt and ground cloves
- Whirl everything in a blender until smooth and creamy. It may help to let the bananas soften at room temperature for about 5 minutes. Enjoy immediately or freeze it for later.
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Ooh, this looks delicious and I love that you don’t need an ice cream maker! Thank you so much for sharing all of these recipes and your story. I’m super impressed that you have gotten your colitis under control through diet. What an inspiration you are! I have a good friend with crohn’s disease, and all of her western doctors have told her that changing her diet won’t really affect her disease. She’s also lactose intolerant, so I’ll be passing this along to her 🙂
I made this tonight and LOVED it. It was my first time making banana ice cream, and the creaminess was amazing. What a revelation. As someone who loooooves all things dairy but does better with only small amount of it, I’m thrilled to have a truly delicious alternative. I foresee making this over and over. Thanks for such a wonderful idea!
You have so made my day with this! I LOVE chai. SO MUCH. I’ve missed it because it’s caffeinated and I make some from scratch from time to time with rooiboos but it’s not the same. I’m gonna add raw cacao powder and a dash of maca and WIN the day!
I decided to try this recipe tonight after I read all the comments raving how good it is… I followed the recipe to a tee and lets just say mine came out no where near to what the comments are suggesting. I have no idea why, I used all the exact spices in the same measurements and it turned out with leaving a terrible taste in my mouth. My mom and I both kept trying to add more and more ingredients to combat the entirely too powerful spices (vanilla, sugar, cinnamon sugar, coconut milk, etc) we ended up giving up and dumping it. What a waste! The strange part is we are both HUGE fans of chai which is what made me want to try it in the first place……
Advice???
This is a wonderful recipe especially during the coronavirus lockdown when one tends to end up with a lotta leftover bananas in the freezer! It’s SO creamy and yummy and satisfies the vegans and non-sugar people in my household too. I use almond butter and a pinch more ginger and cloves since I love that. People who complain here are using vanilla…. I don’t know why. No vanilla is called for (or needed… Bananas are sweet enough! I use bananas that have turned brown so I froze them). Maybe it’s not right for people who don’t like chai spices but for us who do, it’s a gorgeous recipe. Yum!!
So glad you enjoyed this recipe, thanks for your feedback!