Summer on east coast is hot, hot, hot and a great way to keep cool is with some homemade ice cream. This past weekend, we chose to celebrate the summer heat with some fresh blueberries and strawberries. And a great way to compliment your homemade ice cream? By sandwiching them between two shortbread cookies! This was our first time making ice cream sandwiches and they are a cinch to make if you have some patience (or just a weekend) but we promise, they are worth the wait. Make a few to serve at your next summer BBQ!

Ingredients:

Ice Cream

• 3 cups of berries (here we used a mix of strawberries and blueberries, but any will work)
• 2 cups of heavy cream
• 2/3 cup half and half
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 cup sugar

Shortbread Cookies

• 2 sticks of butter, room temperature
• 2 cups of all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup of confectioner’s sugar
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp of salt
• 1 cookie cutter

For this recipe, I chose to make a non-custard ice cream base (i.e. no eggs). I thought that a slightly lighter base would go well with the blueberries. So I instead used Ben & Jerry’s premium base recipe – it’s a very rich recipe, featuring mostly cream. I modified it slightly by adding a bit of milk to smooth it out. This recipe should be eaten quickly (no problem, right?), as it tends to allow ice crystal formation if stored in the freezer too long.

Combine the berries with 3/4 cup of sugar over medium heat in a small saucepan. The berries will start to plump and give off their juices. Allow them to cook down until the sugar is all dissolved and the mixture is just starting to turn syrupy or jam-like.

Remove from heat and split into two portions. Mix and blend 1/2 of the berry mixture with the milk and the half and half in a blender (or use a handy immersion blender like I did!). Store the other half covered in the fridge for now. If you are using seedy berries like raspberries, you can strain the mixture to remove the seeds. Beat the cream and the remaining 1/4 cup of sugar together until the sugar is dissolved. Mix this together with with the milk-half and half mixture. Cover and store in the fridge for at least 8 hours until ready to churn.

The next day, add the berry ice cream base to your ice cream machine and allow to churn (just follow the manufacturer’s directions). Once the ice cream is thickened and almost finished, add the remaining half of the macerated berries to the ice cream and churn some more until well-combined.

Line a baking dish with wax paper with overhangs. Pour your ice cream mixture in the baking dish and neatly spread out the ice cream for a flat layer of ice cream. Line the to of the ice cream with wax also (this prevents ice formation). Allow the ice cream to freeze at least 1 hour to overnight.

The shortbread cookies can be made at any time during the ice cream process. We used Joy of Baking’s recipe which worked out perfectly with our sunflower cookie cutter. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. With a hand mixer, beat the butter until creamy for 1 minute. Add the sugar until smooth. Add the vanilla until smooth. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and the salt. Using a spatula or a wooden spoon, slowly stir in the dry ingredients with the butter mixture.

Once combined, roll out the dough into a flat disk and wrap with plastic and refrigerate for at least an hour or until ready to bake.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/4 inch thick and cut out your desired shape. Bake the cookies on a greased baking sheet or parchment paper and bake for 10 minutes. Allow the cookies to cool before assembling your sandwich.

Remove the ice cream from the baking dish by lifting the ice cream using the overhangs of your parchment paper (this works really well!). Using the same cookie cutter, cut out your shaped ice cream and place in between two cookies. I recommend re-freezing the sandwiches for at least 10-15 minutes before serving.

You can make the sandwiches ahead of time and store in the freezer before serving, just wrap each individual sandwich with some plastic wrap. Enjoy your berry-cool treat!