Make a homemade vanilla custard ice cream filled with pieces of crunchy Oreo cookies. With six ingredients and an ice cream machine, you'll have rich and delicious cookies and cream ice cream.
This homemade cookies and cream ice cream made with Oreo sandwich cookies is an iconic recipe. If you are an ice cream lover, you have to give this flavor a try!
There are many ice cream maker recipes, but this one is special because it's a blend of French-style vanilla custard mixed with chocolate cookie wafers. It's rich, creamy, and filled with the perfect bites of chocolate.
You will need an ice cream machine for this recipe. Any of the major brands such as Breville, Cuisinart, KitchenAid, Pampered Chef, or Whynter will work.
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What You'll Learn In This Recipe
- How to make a custard-style ice cream with egg yolks. This ice cream base can be used with mix-ins other than Oreo cookies.
- The science behind the ingredients used in ice cream.
- Why it's important to cook ice cream bases containing egg yolks.
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Ingredients You Need
Here are the ingredients you'll need to make homemade Oreo cookie ice cream, along with the science behind each of the ingredients.
Heavy cream: Cream, sometimes labeled as whipping cream, is what helps give the ice cream a rich, creamy mouthfeel. Both cream and milk are the butterfat components in the ice cream.
Whole milk: The fat in whole milk is important to achieving the creaminess in ice cream. Do not try substituting for other milk with a lesser fat content or plant-based milk. It will not result in the same texture.
Milk is important in ice cream because it helps add water, which is necessary for the mixture to freeze properly.
Vanilla extract: I love to use vanilla extract to help add a boost of flavor to the ice cream. You can also use a vanilla bean if you'd prefer.
Egg yolks: This recipe is classified as a French-style custard. All custard ice cream is known for its high percentage of egg yolks. The eggs enhance the richness and silky texture of the ice cream.
Don't forget that any ice cream base that uses eggs requires cooking to kill any potentially harmful bacteria.
Granulated sugar: Sugar is a necessary ingredient to add sweetness. It also lowers the freezing point of the water, which keeps the ice cream from completely freezing up and making the ice cream too hard.
Oreo cookies: This recipe wouldn't be complete without Oreos. An off-brand chocolate sandwich cookie would work too. If you have a gluten allergy, simply replace this ingredient with gluten-free Oreos.
How To Make This Recipe
Here's how to make homemade oreo cookie ice cream.
1. Cook the heavy cream, milk, and vanilla over medium heat in a heavy bottom saucepan. Allow the mixture to slowly heat up until you see steam rising from the saucepan, along with small bubbles around the edges.
At this stage, make sure the mixture does not boil. You can reduce the heat if necessary.
2. While the cream and milk are cooking, mix the egg yolks and granulated sugar together with a whisk. Egg yolks are an important ingredient in French-style custard ice cream, and they help with the rich flavor and creamy texture.
3. Now that the cream and milk are steaming, it's time to temper the egg yolks. This is a process that combines two ingredients of different temperatures. By combining the ingredients slowly, it allows the temperature of the eggs to gradually increase so they don't become scrambled.
Ladle a scoop of the hot cream and milk into the egg yolks.
4. Then, quickly whisk the mixture together. I usually like to do this process twice to ensure the eggs are at a good temperature.
5. Now that the temperature of the eggs has increased from tempering, it's time to add the egg mixture back into the saucepan. Give the mixture a whisk until everything is thoroughly combined.
6. Once combined, keep cooking and whisking the ice cream base until it reaches 180°F on an instant-read thermometer. Heating it to this temperature ensures any potentially harmful bacteria from the eggs is killed off.
7. Place a bowl with a fine mesh strainer into an ice bath. Strain the ice cream base. If any of the eggs got scrambled in the cooking or tempering process, this will help catch them so they don't mess with the ice cream base texture.
8. Keep the base in the ice bath until it stops steaming. Then, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 4 - 8 hours, or up to overnight. The temperature should reach 40 - 42°F during this time in the refrigerator. It's really important that the base is properly cooled before churning it.
9. Place the Oreo cookies in a plastic bag. Using a rolling pin, crush the cookies into bite-sized pieces. You don't want the cookies too finely crushed. The large pieces of cookies are what makes this ice cream so delicious.
10. Next, it's time to churn the ice cream. Pour the mixture into an ice cream machine (I use a Whynter machine with a built-in compressor). Don't completely fill the ice cream machine bowl. Once air is incorporated into the ice cream from the machine, the ice cream will expand in volume. This is called overrun.
11. Churn the ice cream according to the manufacturer's directions. It usually takes about 20 - 25 minutes for the ice cream to turn into a soft-serve consistency. About three minutes before the ice cream is done freezing, add ¾ cup of the crushed Oreo cookies into the ice cream machine.
12. Finally, grab a storage container. Add in a scoop of the ice cream, then top with a scoop of Oreo cookies. Repeat this process until you've run out of ice cream and cookies.
Then, place the ice cream in the freezer to "cure" or harden up for a couple of hours.
Expert Tips
- If you're using an ice cream machine that requires you to pre-freeze the mixing bowl, don't forget to place it in the freezer 24 hours before churning.
- The best way to store ice cream is in the back of the freezer in a long, plastic Tupperware. You want to keep the ice cream at a cold, stable temperature in order to prevent the ice cream from becoming icy and grainy.
- Always allow the ice cream base to completely cool before churning. If you want your ice cream to properly freeze in the ice cream maker, it needs to be cold (around 40-42°F).
Recipe FAQs
If there aren't too many bits, yes. You should be able to save this. Just make sure you strain the mixture through a fine mesh strainer and discard all the bits. It takes some time to learn how to properly temper eggs.
Yes, you can make the ice cream base ahead of time and store the mixture tightly covered in plastic wrap in the refrigerator for 24 - 48 hours ahead of churning.
Oreo ice cream is typically made with a vanilla base and Oreo sandwich cookies as the mix-in. The key to a good Oreo ice cream is large chunks of crushed Oreo cookies running throughout the ice cream.
It's best to crush the Oreos by placing them in a plastic bag and using a rolling pin. This allows you to crush the cookies into large pieces, which is the perfect consistency for Oreo cookie ice cream.
A blender or food processor will leave the cookies crushed too finely.
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Oreo Cookie Ice Cream (6 Ingredients)
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 ½ cups heavy cream
- 1 ½ cup whole milk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 6 large egg yolks
- 1 ¼ cup granulated sugar
- 14 ounces Oreo sandwich cookies
Instructions
- Fill a large bowl with ice to use later as an ice bath. Place an empty bowl on top of the ice. Set aside.
- In a heavy bottom saucepan combine heavy cream, milk, and vanilla. Cook over medium heat until mixture is steaming and small bubbles start to form around the edge of the pot, around 8 minutes.
- Meanwhile, whisk egg yolks and sugar together in a medium sized mixing bowl. Once the milk and cream mixture is steaming, stream a ladle full of the hot mixture over the eggs while quickly whisking.
- Add the egg mixture back into the saucepan with milk and cream. Whisk to combine. Continue to cook, stirring constantly, until the ice cream base reaches 180°F on an instant-read thermometer.
- Place a fine mesh strainer over the empty bowl on top of the ice bath. Strain ice cream base. Chill ice cream base until it has stopped steaming. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 4 - 8 hours, or up to overnight. The temperature should reach 40 - 42°F during this time in the refrigerator.
- Add Oreo cookies to a plastic bag. Crush up the cookies using a rolling pin into bite-sized pieces.
- Pour the ice cream base into an ice cream maker and process for about 20 - 25 minutes, or according to the manufacturer's directions. About three minutes before the ice cream is done churning, add ¾ cup of the crushed Oreo cookies into the ice cream machine. Once completely churned, the ice cream should be a soft serve consistency.
- Add a scoop of ice cream to a storage container, then top with a scoop of the remaining Oreo cookies. Continue this process until all the ice cream and Oreo cookies have been transferred to the storage container.
- Place the ice cream in the freezer to "cure" or harden up for a couple of hours. Store in an airtight container in the freezer for up to 2 - 3 weeks.
Kara
I really enjoyed this recipe! I've made quite a few of your ice cream recipes, but this one has to be my favorite....maybe it's just because I'm obsessed with Oreos.
Pat
I made this over the weekend and it turned out great. I just added more ingredients to my shopping list for an upcoming potluck. Better than great !
Morris
This was so good this weekend. Mine wasn't as pretty but we ate it all!