This rich, dreamy chocolate chocolate chip ice cream recipe is not for the faint of heart. It’s churned with melted chocolate and creamy coconut milk for the most luxurious taste and finish. And instead of full-size chocolate chips (which can be too hard when frozen!) it’s spiked with straciatella-style flakes that melt in your mouth with each bite.
Dairy-Free Chocolate Chocolate Chip Ice Cream for True Chocoholics
My friend Hannah Kaminsky is the foremost vegan ice cream expert. She often gets a bit exotic with flavors, but this dairy-free chocolate chocolate chip ice cream plays on her continued love for the classics. It’s a sample from her book, Vegan A La Mode, which we shared over a decade ago. We’ve since updated this post and also have a few quick ingredient tips and substitution options, should you need them.
- Cocoa Powder: Since this recipe isn’t heavily sweetened, it’s important to use a Dutch-processed cocoa powder. Natural unsweetened cocoa powders need to react with an acid to lose some of their bitterness, so they can taste a bit too bitter in recipes like this one.
- Starch: If you don’t have arrowroot on hand, you can substitute non-GMO cornstarch or tapioca starch in its place.
- Lighter Finish: This makes a very rich dairy-free ice cream. I you want to lighten it up a little, you can use part milk beverage in place of some of the coconut milk. Pour the contents of 1 can of coconut milk into a glass measuring cup, and add milk beverage until it reaches 3 cups.
Special Diet Notes: Dairy-Free Chocolate Chocolate Chip Ice Cream
By ingredients, this recipe is dairy-free / non-dairy, egg-free, gluten-free, grain-free, nut-free, peanut-free, soy-free, vegan / plant-based and vegetarian. Just be sure to choose the chocolate chips that suit your dietary needs.
- ¼ cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
- 2 tablespoons arrowroot starch
- ¼ teaspoon instant coffee powder
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
- Generous pinch ground cinnamon
- 3 cups full-fat canned coconut milk
- ½ cup light agave nectar
- ½ cup dairy-free semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- ½ cups dairy-free semi-sweet chocolate chips or chopped chocolate
- In a large saucepan, whisk together the cocoa powder, arrowroot, coffee powder, salt, and cinnamon. Whisk in about 1 cup of the coconut milk to form a thick paste and remove any lumps. Once smooth, whisk in the remaining coconut milk and agave nectar.
- Place the pan over medium heat, and whisk occasionally as it comes up to temperature. When bubbles begin forming around the edges of the liquid, add in the chocolate chips, and just let the mixture sit for 2 minutes, to allow the chocolate to begin melting.
- Switch over to a wide spatula, and stir gently, scraping the bottom and sides of the pan, to make sure that nothing sticks and that the chocolate fully melts. Once the mixture comes up to a full boil, cook for just a minute or two longer.
- Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the vanilla extract.
- Let the mixture cool completely before moving it into the refrigerator to chill for about 2 hours.
- Once fully chilled, churn the mixture in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.
- When the ice cream is about 5 minutes away from finishing in the machine, melt down the chocolate chips, and slowly drizzle the liquid chocolate in a thin stream directly into the ice cream machine. It will freeze instantly on the surface of the ice cream, and the turning paddle will break it up into nice little chips.
- Transfer the ice cream into a freezer-safe container and freeze for at least 3 hours before serving.
More Rich, Creamy, Dairy-Free Ice Cream Recipes
Peanut Butter Chunk Ice Cream
Cookies & Cream Ice Cream
Maple Pecan Gelato
2 Comments
Hi, I was wondering if you could explain using full fat coconut milk. Im starting the Paleo diet and love coconut so have a bunch of recipes calling for full fat coconut milk…When it says to use ,lets say a cup of full fat , am I scraping the top fat ( creamy stuff ) off the can top of coconut milk and leaving the liquid under it alone? Does full fat mean using just the creamy stuff on the top..?.I have looked everyplace and cannot find what using full fat really means..thank You.
Jan Navales
Hi Jan, see this post – http://www.godairyfree.org/news/how-to-use-coconut-milk – as it describes, the full fat is the whole can (shaken). Only separate and use just the thick part if they call for coconut cream, specifically.