An Ode to the Days of Green Ice Cream

Every summer, my grandmother would make homemade ice cream with her electric ice cream maker, and it made an awfully loud growling sound (which seemed to last a lifetime). Despite its racket, we’d sit around the contraption with childlike excitement. My brother and I would roll our eyes as my dad would tell us the same story he always did — his misadventures of hand churning ice cream when he was a kid. Apparently, it was torturous.

Can you imagine my confusion when I learned we were making ice cream in my sophomore chemistry class? I remember looking around for the electric ice cream maker and wondering how listening to a machine scream for the rest of the class would teach us about chemistry. But there wasn’t an ice cream maker, electric or otherwise. Instead, boxes of sealable bags sprinkled our lab stations.

I had little faith in the method my instructor described. It seemed simple enough, but I doubted a plastic bag could replicate the apparatus I grew up with. Because it was Earth Day, my teacher had us put green food coloring in our little concoction. To my surprise, we made ice cream. Green ice cream.

When I came home that afternoon, I replicated the experiment for my parents — green food coloring and all. As spring melted into summer, colorful ice cream became my weapon against the Texas heat. It was perfect. Summer wasn’t just a season, but a time for celebrating. Those months were meant for sun-kissed hair and swimming. For fun and frozen treats.

Whenever my best friend would come over, we’d double the recipe and take turns shaking the frigid bag, like an oxymoronic game of hot potato. Then, we would split the fruits of our labor with satisfied smiles framed by green tinted lips. We would giggle away the brain freezes and warm our chilled teeth with sugar-coated tongues. That summer was sweet, and marked by the warm aromatic of vanilla and the fainting flickers of childhood.

I remember coming home one day, and seeing my dad eating ice cream out of a bag. It wasn’t green or blue. Instead, it was white, like a canvas that was never blessed by paint. It was just vanilla ice cream — there was no need for it to be green. But at sixteen, I still saw colors when there were none, and we did nonsensical things just for the experience.

Now that I’m looking back as an adult, I fear that one day I will no longer feel the need to make simple things beautiful. I fear one day I won’t feel the need to make my ice cream green. But until then, I will keep making colorful treats. My house will be full of blue pancakes for my nephew, and purple icing for my niece. Perhaps, before I become colorblind with age, I’ll teach my children how to make their own colorful ice cream. Maybe they will favor pink or purple or blue, but maybe they’ll choose green.

Colorful Ice Cream in a Bag (1 serving)

Ingredients & Supplies:

• 1/2 cup of half and half (can substitute for whole milk or cream)
• 1 tbsp of sugar
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• Food coloring
• 1/3 cup of rock salt or coarse salt
• 4 cups of ice
• 1 quart-sized sealable bag
• 1 gallon-sized sealable bag

Optional:

• Ducktape
• Hand towel

Instructions:

1. In the quart-sized bag, add half and half, sugar, vanilla, and a few drops of food coloring. Seal bag. If you can't completely seal the bag, use ducktape across the opening.
2. In the gallon-sized bag, add the ice and salt.
3. Place your soon-to-be-ice-cream bag inside your ice bag and seal it tightly. Blowing up the gallon bag with a little bit of air can make the next step a little easier.
4. Shake the bag like your life depends on it for about 5 to 8 minutes (it can get pretty cold so you may want to wrap it in a hand towel). After 5 minutes, it will be about the consistency of soft serve and will become firmer if you shake it for longer.
5. Once it reaches the desired consistency, remove the smaller bag and give a quick rinse with cool water to remove any remaining salt. If your ice cream isn't as firm as you'd like, pop it in the freezer for a few minutes.
6. Then, enjoy your sweet treat right out of the bag or transfer it to a bowl and add your favorite toppings.

Feel free to experiment with different flavors! Not a fan of vanilla? Add a little bit of chocolate syrup. Love mint chocolate ice cream? Throw in some mint extract and chocolate chips. But whatever you do... don't forget the food coloring!