4-Ingredient Homemade Orange Creamsicle Ice Cream

Oranges and cream are a classic combination. Recreating the refreshing, creamy, cool experience of an orange creamsicle in your own kitchen is easier than ever. As an added bonus, you get to skip the artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives. The result is not-too-sweet ice cream with a pure, real orange flavor. You don’t even need an ice cream maker — just a few simple ingredients, a good food processor, and a few hours for chilling.

You’ll need:
2 large oranges
2 cups half-and-half
1/4 cup sugar (or more to taste)
1 tablespoon vodka (optional, but helps keep the mixture from freezing too hard)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation:
1) Wash and zest the oranges and set the zest aside.

2) Peel and divide the oranges into sections. Lay out the sections on a cookie sheet, lined with parchment or wax paper.

3) Freeze orange sections for 2 hours.

4) In a food processor, combine the orange sections, orange zest, sugar, vodka (if using), and vanilla extract and process, slowly adding about half of the half-and-half while the motor is running. Stop to scrape down the sides of the food processor, and continue to process, adding the rest of the half-and-half, until mixture is smooth.

5) Pour mixture into a container (this will make a generous quart of ice cream) and freeze until solid, 3 hours or so. Before serving, let the ice cream rest for 15 minutes or so at room temperature so it’s nice and scoopable.