Easy homemade Cherry Ice Cream without an ice cream maker! This no-churn recipe with cherries is so creamy and has so much depth of flavor, you’d never know it was made with just a handful of ingredients and barely any time. Fresh cherries are cooked down into a jammy compote that’s then stirred into a simple ice vanilla and almond ice cream base.
A homemade ice cream flavor I love to make all year round is cherry. This no-churn recipe is extremely simple to make with just 6 ingredients and 15 minutes or prep time.
We thoroughly tested this recipe to ensure the cherries wouldn’t become icy in texture when frozen in the ice cream base. To avoid this, we make the cherries into a jam on the stovetop that’s stirred into a vanilla almond base.
Our second no-churn ice cream ingredient for success is sweetened condensed milk. This reduced milk that’s thick and creamy thanks to less water content as well, freezes beautifully into a rich texture that’s ideal for ice cream.
So forget freezing the bowl of the clunky electric maker, our recipe is a foolproof method that anyone will be able to replicate at home. If you love making ice cream try our Lemon Poppyseed Ice Cream or Mango Sorbet.
Why This Recipe Works
- 6 Ingredients: just six simple ingredients is all you need! Cherries, honey, sweetened condensed milk, heavy cream, vanilla extract and almond extract. No custard needs to be made—just whip the cream and fold the ingredients together!
- No Churn: the beauty of this method is you don’t need to chill a freezer bowl and churn the ice cream. Simple fold the ingredients into the whipped cream and freeze in a chilled loaf pan.
- Versatile: switch things up with a different fruit! Make a homemade fruit compote or simple fold in your favorite jam. Play around with different extracts, mix-ins and toppings.
Table of contents
Ingredients
- Sweetened condensed milk: this is a canned milk product where water has been removed and sugar has been added. The result is a thick and luscious sauce. It’s an essential ingredient here for a few reasons. One, it sweetens the ice cream. And two, since it has a low water content it doesn’t form ice crystals when frozen—perfect for no-churn ice cream!
- Almond and vanilla extract: the combo of these extracts really enhances the flavor of the cherries.
- Heavy cream: for the best results use a quality heavy cream (sometimes labeled and sold as heavy whipping cream) and make sure it is very chilled prior to whipping.
- Fresh sweet cherries — I love using Moon Cherries because they are firm and full of flavor! August is the best season for Moon Cherries so make sure you grab a big soon! You can also use any sweet cherry variety. Frozen cherries also work here.
- Honey: used to sweeten the cherry mixture as it cooks down. You can also use regular sugar instead.
How to Make Cherry Ice Cream
- Cook the cherries down with a bit of honey, mashing with a potato masher, until thickened and resembles a fruit compote. Remove from heat and let cool completely.
- Combine the sweetened condensed milk, extracts and salt in a large bowl.
- Whip the cold cream until nearly stiff peaks form. What do I mean by nearly? You don’t want perfectly perky stiff peaks, but you do want it to hold most of its shape when scooped.
4. In small increments, fold whipped cream into sweetened condensed milk mixture.
5. Fold cooled cherry mixture into the cream mixture.
6. Spread into prepared container and freeze until solid.
Why Cook the Cherries?
I initially tested this will fresh cherries simple minced in the food processor and folded into the ice cream base. I wanted this recipe to be as simple and stress-free as possible. But the problem with adding fresh cherries, and their juices, is they add too much water to the ice cream base resulting in an icy texture.
Cooking the cherries down with a bit of honey does three things. One, it concentrates the cherry flavor. Two, it cooks off the excess water. And three, honey helps to make the ice cream smoother and more creamy by reducing the formation of ice crystals, and it makes it slightly softer which makes it more scoopable.
Pro Tips for Making Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream
- Don’t over-whip the cream. It should be whipped to nearly stiff peaks. Too stiff and the ice cream will take on an overly-fatty mouthfeel that leaves a buttery layer in your mouth.
- Let the cherry mixture cool completely. If the mixture is folded in while still warm, much of the air incorporated into the whipped cream will deflate.
- Work quickly. Once the cherry mixture is completely cooled, start whipping the cream. Then immediately fold it into the sweetened condensed milk gently. Once everything is mixed together, transfer it to a container and pop it in the freezer right away.
Storage & Leftovers Tips
- Store the ice cream in the freezer in an airtight container or wrapped well with plastic wrap for up to 2 months.
- If it’s too hard or icy at first when serving, allow to temper on the counter for 5 to 10 minutes until easy to scoop.
Heavy Cream vs. Whipping Cream
The difference lies in fat content.
Heavy cream (heavy whipping cream) has at least 36% milk fat per the FDA to be labeled as such.
Whipping cream (or sometimes labeled as “light”) contains less fat, clocking in at 30–35% milk fat.
So how should they be used? Both whip really well, but the higher the fat, the more stable the whipped cream will be. Heavy whipping cream is great for piping, no-churn ice cream, and pastry filling. Lower-fat whipping cream is light and pillowy and best served right away as it will deflate and turn to liquid over time.
Heavy cream is our choice for this cherry ice cream recipe.
Variations
Cherry ice cream is so versatile with different flavors you can easily mix into the ice cream base before freezing. Here are some of our suggestions:
- Add some chocolate: fold chopped dark chocolate chunks or swirl chocolate sauce into the ice cream base right before serving. Top servings with chocolate chunks (or chocolate chips), shavings, sauce or shell.
- Make it into Cherry Garcia ice cream: swirl chocolate fudge into the base mixture right before freezing. Serve with additional fudge.
- Add some caramel: swirl caramel sauce into the base right before serving.
- Add some red wine to the cherries: add ¼ cup red wine to the cherries as they cook down.
- Make it a vanilla bean cherry flavor: swap the almond and vanilla extract for 2–3 teaspoons vanilla bean paste.
- Try a cherry almond flavor: increase the almond extract to 2 teaspoons and fold in ½ cup chopped or sliced toasted almonds.
Frequently Asked Questions
We recommend fresh dark sweet cherries or you can use the frozen kind as well. You could also try tart cherries when they are in season, this will be a sweet and sour ice cream flavor.
We cook ours down into a compote which thickens the sugars and removes some of the water content to prevent them from becoming icy.
More Cherry Recipes to Try
Cherry Ice Cream (No-Churn recipe)
Description
Ingredients
- 3 cups Stemilt Moon Cherries pitted
- 3 tablespoons honey
- 1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk)
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla
- 1 teaspoon pure almond extract
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 cups heavy whipping cream chilled
Instructions
- Cook cherries and honey in a medium saucepan over medium heat, mashing with a potato masher, until jammy and thick, 10 minutes; cool completely. Cherry mixture should measure 1½ cups.
- Line a 9×5-inch loaf pan with parchment paper (you can also use two pint freezer containers).
- Combine sweetened condensed milk, vanilla extract, almond extract, and salt in a large bowl.
- Using a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment (or a hand held mixer), beat heavy cream on medium high speed until nearly stiff peaks form.
- Fold a scoop of whipped cream into sweetened condensed milk until mostly combined. Continue folding whipped cream into sweetened condensed milk in increments until nearly combined; fold in cooled cherry mixture (reserve a spoonful for swirling).
- Spread ice cream base into prepared loaf pan or freezer pints. Dollop reserved cherry mixture over top then swirl using a toothpick or skewer. Cover with parchment paper (or lid) and freeze until form, at least 8 hours.
Delicious recipe and so easy to make, thank you. Pretty much followed the instructions as written with the only modification of using 2.5 cups whipping cream because we prefer slightly less sweet knowing the condensed milk can be overpowering and also added a little more almond extract. It was the perfect! Used fresh pitted Bing cherries and would probably go with 4 cups next time. I was able to make 4 pints from this and my husband raved it was a keeper recipe. Thank you!
Hi Linda, I’m so glad you enjoyed this! Great idea to sub with a bit more whipping cream—I’ll have to try that next time. Thanks for the review!
For a no churn ice cream it’s very good, and easy to make!
Can you use light whipping cream ?