The Easiest, Most Delicious & Nutritious Ice Cream You'll Ever Make!

Confession time, I have a sweet tooth. A very serious sweet tooth, which has made switching to a whole foods, plant based diet incredibly difficult at times. After years spent eating prepackaged, processed foods (especially faux meat products), microwavable meals, tons of pasta, and store bought condiments & sauces which are all LOADED with large amounts of refined sugar, I developed a very real physical addiction without even realizing it. I eventually began suffering from withdraws where I'd become anxious, and have intense mood swings when my body was craving sugar. Late night 7-11, and supermarket runs became a norm for me, and nights when I couldn't get my fix I'd toss and turn all night until I'd eventually scrounge up a high carb, bread heavy meal to fill the void. Even when I began to find my way into healthy eating I still had cravings, and major setbacks all because I hadn't yet realized that even some of the "healthy" foods I was eating at the time still contained high amounts of sugar.

Well I still get cravings, I'm afraid that won't ever go away, because I really do just love sweets. The difference now is that I don't feel an intense *need* to consume sugar regularly, which means I really get to enjoy the desserts that I make. So here's an incredibly simple dessert that's not only immensely scrumptious, but is jam packed with all kinds of goodness our bodies need to thrive.

Chocolate Almond Crunch Ice Cream

Serves 2-4

Ingredients:

-4 Large ripe or overripe Bananas

-4 to 6 Tbsp. raw Cacao powder

-1 Tbsp. raw Honey

-1/2 tsp. Bee Pollen (you can purchase Bee Pollen at most health food stores, or online here, but it's preferable to try and find locally sourced pollen which I buy at our farmers markets.)

-4 Tbsp. raw crunchy Almond Butter

You won't actually taste the bee pollen, but it packs a serious nutritious punch. Bee pollen is made up of about 25% protein, and contains 22 amino acids, 18 vitamins including numerous B vitamins (B12 included), 25 minerals, and 11 enzymes or co-enzymes. It's considered by many to be one of the earth's most perfect foods.

Method:

-Thinly slice your bananas, and place them single layer onto a parchment sheet lined pan, cover with another sheet of parchment paper and place it in the freezer for about 1 hour. IMPORTANT, you want the bananas to be very cold, but not completely frozen solid.

-Place your frozen bananas, honey, bee pollen, and cacao powder into a blender, blend on low speed at first, gradually getting faster as you help to press all of your ingredients down with a tamper.

-Once well blended, scoop into any kind of freezer safe container, I just used one of my glass tupperwear containers. Layer a bit of your ice cream, then swirl some almond butter in, and add more layers until all of your ice cream has been transferred into the freezer safe container.

-Place back into freezer for at least 3 hours, or until your ice cream "sets." Scoop, and serve.

It was late when I made mine, and I didn't want to wait, so I ate mine straight out of the blender, which made the consistency a bit thin. Allowing it to set in the freezer will give you a more solid, ice cream-like consistency. But you will not be able to tell the difference between the consistency of this and regular dairy ice cream, they are wonderfully similar. I scooped half out for myself, and saved the other half in the freezer.