Kids’ Activity: Make Your Own Ice Cream

My boys and I had so much fun with this! We’re in Australia so instead of ‘half and half’ we used half cream, half full cream milk… and it worked well. The only thing was we were a bit vigorous with the shaking and the inside baggie broke, resulting in a still delicious albeit slightly salty ice cream! Thanks for the activity idea!

tried this today, did not work. shook it for half hour adding salt and more ice. still did not work.

“hopelessly uncrafty” will now feature on all my biographies.

Love this! I remember making butter in an elementary class as well by shaking a jar and passing it around in a circle. It was so much fun!

Something similar to this: https://littlebinsforlittlehands.com/how-to-make-butter-in-a-jar/

(not my website)

I love that you’re finding simple hands-on activities that are fun for the family!

I learned how to do this in school as a kid using a coffee can! We put a smaller container with the mixture inside the coffee can and put the ice and salt around it. Then you just roll the coffee can.

I remember doing this as a kid, and our salty ice water leaked into our ice cream bag, causing the ice cream to taste super salty!

Oh that is so cool. We have an ice cream maker (by Dash) and I love it. But it’s fun to find out about new, fun, and even simple ways to make it. Related, I found out a way to make whipped cream. You take a mason jar and put the heavy cream in with a few frozen marbles and shake for a while. It’s the most fun passing it around for turns to shake it. The whipped cream wasn’t as thick but there was something fresh about it that is lost with the beaters or hand blender wisk.

You know, crafts can be fun, but lots of other activities are just as great—and doing things you dislike doing rarely turns out to be fun for your kids. And not all kids enjoy doing crafts either! So keep on being yourselves, all you parents out there in this strange time, and just keep connecting with your kids in whatever way works for you!

When I was a kid I LOVED watching Zoom on PBS (the 90s/00s version – it was based on a 70s series). They’d do games and crafts and recipes, including making homemade ice cream similar to this way. It looks like the videos are sporadically available on YouTube now – highly recommend! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCik_Rf2BCZJblalNr89ImFw (if the link doesn’t work – try searching for the channel “ZOOMTube”)

We make vegan ice cream all summer long. 1 cup Almond milk, 1/2 cup quality cocoa powder, 1 tbsp vanilla, mix and add to silicon muffin trays. Freeze for an hour or so and add tongue depressors. Let freeze over night. Pop’em out to eat.

We used to do this in girl scout camp. If you double bag the ice cream then fill a coffee can with salt and ice you can roll it back and forth to each other.