This Ninja CREAMi vegan ice cream may become your new favorite “nice cream”!
Made with a few key (even secret!) ingredients, this vegan ice cream recipe is not just delicious – but quite simple to prepare.
Even better, this ice cream doesn’t have even one slice of banana… and not a drop of coconut milk or other coconut products. (No hate on bananas, it’s just they make all nice creams taste the same. No hate on coconut either, but people hate on my recipes when they include coconut! So, I take a breather from coconut comments and reviews.)
And, as much as I love chocolate… I don’t always want chocolate ice cream. In fact, vanilla ice creams are my favorite (unless the ice cream has some chunky bits of cookie or caramel swirl goodness in it – chocolate or vanilla that’s a bonus). I regularly have Nora’s ice cream in my freezer, and when I can get in a US grocery shop… Wicked vanilla.
Actually, I have more than a *little* selection of vegan Ice creams in my freezer. I love trying new vegan ice cream brands that make their way to stores – and consider it my duty as a vegan foodie to know all the flavors. 🤩
Trouble is, for me anyhow, a great many popular vegan ice cream brands include pea protein as an ingredient. I’m not sure why, maybe as a filler or to make the ice cream look more nutritious. (I mean, it’s ice cream, I don’t think we need to look at protein count). 🤷🏻♀️
So, I scour ingredient labels to buy varieties that don’t have pea protein – and there are only a few! Which is why making ice cream at home is so brilliant. Not only can you avoid those sneaky troublesome ingredients, you can also tweak the amount of sweetener, or add other flavors and add-ins as you like.
Up until this Ninja CREAMi machine hit the market, making vegan ice cream was possible, but not simplified. Since many vegan ice creams use bananas or other whole foods ingredients, when they are frozen after churning, they turn rock-hard!
Enter the Ninja CREAMi, which takes that rock-hard vessel and turns it into luscious and unbelievably dreamy ice cream.
When I got this machine, I knew the first vegan ice cream recipe I wanted to make with it would be vanilla. I think vanilla is often overstepped to create a chocolate or nutty version of vegan nice cream. Probably because bananas are usually in the base and so chocolate and nuts help to balance the flavor (and mask the color when bananas oxidize).
When I finished this recipe, our youngest daughter, Hope, said “Mom, I think this is the best ice cream you’ve made“. 💚
I won’t disagree! It’s delicious and really simple to prepare the blend.
The secret ingredient? Come on, guys… you know me…
Yep. Sweet Potatoes.
Not orange sweet spuds, but yellow. Preferable Hannah sweet potatoes, but Murasaki can also be used. I explain more in my video (and also show how to use the Ninja CREAMi):
In addition to the yellow sweet potato, that small amount of oat flour is a must. It brings a thick, creamy texture that only oat flour can offer. And, using flour instead of oats allows for a smoother texture if you don’t have a high-powered blender.
But, if you are shopping for a high-powered blender, I highly recommend a . Pro tip: Shop . These units are brand new housing with a reconditioned motor – basically brand new for a sweet deal.
Now it’s time to get to this ice cream… before it melts!
Yep, catch THAT drip! 😍 x Dreena
NOW try this ice cream with my dreamy vegan fudge sauce!
Vanilla Bean Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 1 cup cooked yellow sweet potato flesh not orange
- 1 1/4 cups plain or vanilla non-dairy milk
- 1/2 cup soaked cashew pieces
- 1/4 – 1/3 cup light unrefined sugar see note
- 2 tbsp oat flour
- 1/4 tsp vanilla bean powder
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
Instructions
- In a blender, add all ingredient and puree until very smooth, stopping to scrape down blender bowl once or twice as needed.
- Transfer mixture to a CREAMi container and freeze (see note).
- Once fully frozen, place in CREAMi machine and set to ice cream function, running through that cycle twice.
- Serve! Once at an easily scoopable, smooth texture, serve!
Christy Li says
The vanilla ice cream with the fudge sauce was so good! I will definitely make it again, thank you!
Dreena Burton says
Thank you Christy, so happy you enjoyed both!
Erica says
Is there any information on how long to roast the potato and how long to soak the cashews. New to whole food recipes, and couldn’t find anything in the comments.
Dreena Burton says
Hi Erica, I tend to put that info in my books so not always in my posts, sorry. Cashews can soak quickly in hot water, about 1-2 hours, at room temp water maybe 3 hours. Sweet potatoes roast in about 45 minutes but depending on size. Some are very small, will be tender in half hour (at 400 or 425).
RoGard says
I haven’t made this yet, but recently bought the Ninja Creami and have been trying to find “healthy” ice cream recipes and want to try this.
Questions:
Can I use any flour for the “oat flour” (chickpea, brown rice, etc)? Also, note the link on your “oat flour” goes to Amazon DATES site and not an oat flour link.
If I can’t find Japanese (yellow) sweet potatoes, what is the “damage” of using orange sweet potatoes? or Yams?
I plan to use real vanilla beans (scraped), how much should I use for your recipe?
I read the comments and understand why you don’t list a specific “non milk” milk, but what did you use in your recipe? (I personally prefer Oat and or Coconut milk as Almond has an odd taste to me.)
Is there (and perhaps I didn’t dig deep enough) a “nutritional facts” list to go along with this recipe? I plan to use Monk Fruit sugar.
Thank you! Can’t wait to try this healthy ice cream.
Dreena Burton says
Hello,
Please do not use brown rice or chickpea flour. Chickpea flour should never be consumed uncooked.
I will check out the link re dates, but you can always search oat flour on amazon.
You can use orange sweet spuds, but the color will be different and slightly more sweet potato flavor using oranges.
I don’t specify milks as people have favorites and whenever I specify one (ie soy or cashew) I am asked for a substitute because of food sensitivities. In and ice cream like this you can use what you prefer, but nothing with a strong flavor (ie hemp milk).
I don’t have the nutritional facts, sorry, you can enter the ingredients here if you’d like to compute, I think it’s free but if not you might need to google another option: https://www.myfitnesspal.com/recipe/calculator
Hope that helps, enjoy!
Dreena
RoGard says
I’m mixing up the batch right now. Are “japanese sweet potatoes” the same as “yellow sweet potatoes”? I went to every market in town, including asian markets and best they had (and i used) was Japanese sweet potato. I very easily made oat flour from rolled oats (in coffee bean grinder) and as mentioned I used Oat Milk as that’s my preferred non milk milk. Will freeze today/tomorrow and run it thru Creami tomorrow. I’m very excited to try this.
Did you come up with a recipe for Butter Pecan? and Mint Choc Chip? Those are favs in my household.
Allison C says
I was hoping to wow my family with this on Thanksgiving. Unfortunately it had a distinct potato aftertaste. The texture was great, though, very smooth. I used the Japanese potatoes from Trader Joe’s and cooked them by boiling. The recipe does not specify how to cook the potatoes, I wonder if this makes a difference. It also drives me nuts when vegan recipes call for “non-dairy milk,” since there is a tremendous amount of variation here. I used vanilla soy milk. Will maybe try cashew.
Dreena Burton says
Hi Allison, I always oven-bake my sweet potatoes, roasting them whole. I don’t use the ones from Trader Joe’s, I find them drier and darker, so that is perhaps why the texture was off. I go over that in my video. And, I used to specific which non-dairy milk, but had too many questions like “can I use almond instead of soy”, etc, etc.
Ellen says
This is absolutely the best Ninja creami vegan ice cream ever. I’ve made it several times and my hubby says it’s “amazingly rich” which considering it has no dairy etc in it and only a modest amount of nuts, is magical. Such a delicious special treat, thank you! 🙂
Dreena Burton says
Thank you so much for the glowing review, Ellen!