Black Banana Ice Cream

I was very fascinated by this ice cream recipe on the MasterChef website as all it uses is frozen bananas! My whole family love bananas so I knew this would be a hit. The best part about this ice-cream is that sugar-free and fat-free. I can’t think of a healthier ice cream that I want to feed my kids with. This is definitely much better than the commercially made ice cream which has loads of cream and artificial colouring. 

The sweetness of the ice cream comes from ripened bananas.  I bought a bunch of bananas and watched it closely for a few days. It had to be very ripe but not so ripe that it spoils. Bananas never sit around for long in my home, so I had to prevent everyone from eating this bunch or else there would be none left for ice cream.

I made this ice-cream twice, once using the small bananas (what is known as the “ang bak jiu” and another time using the larger Del Monte variety. The small bananas were much sweeter and tastier than the large ones. I froze my ice-cream for two hours before serving as it was too water-y right after blending. I couldn’t stop licking the spoon as I was blending the bananas – totally yummilicious! Here is my daughter’s serving on a cone with chocolate ganache left over from my macaron sessions.

Blending frozen fruits into ice cream is such a great idea. I think it would be great to do a berries ice cream with frozen strawberries, blueberries and raspberries. That may need some honey or sugar as berries tend to be more sourish.

Black Banana Ice Cream 
By Matt Preston for MasterChef

Ingredients

• 4 very ripe bananas, frozen, peeled

Method

• Place frozen bananas into the bowl of a stick blender fitted with chopper attachment. Blend until smooth and creamy. Serve immediately.

Notes:

• I froze my bananas overnight with the skin on. Before blending, I used a knife to “shave” the skin off.
• I re-froze the blended bananas for about 1-2 hours before serving as it was too liquid right after blending.