Easy Chocolate Ice Cream Pie

Once frozen, this easy chocolate ice cream pie is one of our favourite summer recipes. It’s makes a healthy, rich and smooth snack or dessert. Taking only 20-25 minutes to prepare, it’s fast, easy and can be stored in the freezer for weeks.

How It’s Made

The filling base is avocado. I love it and Tim needs to turn a blind eye to the idea of eating avocado for dessert. The beautiful thing about this recipe is the versatility it offers. You can put as much or as little of any ingredient in it as you’d like, taste-testing as you go.

1. Chop dates, almonds and mix with salt. Pat into parchment paper lined pie plate.
2. Purée avocado with an immersion blender
3. Whisk nut butter and water together with a fork
4. Combine all filling ingredients together and continue to blend until perfectly smooth. Tweak ingredient ratios according to your preferred taste
5. Pour batter into crust, freeze for a minimum of 5 hours, and out comes a delicious, guilt-free Chocolate Ice Cream Pie!

The Crust

The crust is only 3 ingredients – dates, almonds and some Himalayan sea salt. Dates are an excellent choice of sweetener for desserts as they are a whole food. The fiber helps to offset the effect of natural sugars, which means that blood sugar spikes aren’t so high anymore!

To speed the preparation up, you can pulse nuts in a high-speed blender until your desired size is reached. Smaller chunks will help the crust stick together better. If you have a Vitamix, add all the crust ingredients together and pulse until a “dough” is formed. I chop everything by hand, so that why it can take up to 25 minutes for me to do it all.

For a more crumbly crust, add more almonds. To create a stickier crust, add more dates. If you’re using older dates you may need to start by hydrating them in some hot water for 5 minutes.

Flavour

The flavour of avocado pie needs some serious help, which is why we enlisted cocoa and nut butters. We’ve also had success adding things like a mashed banana into the batter. The recipe provided has a light nutty and chocolate flavour, but I anticipate you might add a little more of one or both to create a richer flavour. We intentionally kept the flavour relatively mild because some people prefer that. You can always add more, but you can’t take away…

If you’re on a paleo diet, consider using almond butter instead of natural peanut butter. When whipping it with water, add water slowly as you may need significantly less than what the recipe calls for though.

Sweetener

A natural liquid sweetener like honey, maple syrup or agave nectar work the best. Amber maple syrup is the darkest maple syrup and has the most flavour because it is a later yield. The earlier the maple syrup is harvested, the lighter the taste will be. This is our #1 choice of sweetener for this recipe.

Benefits of Avocado

Avocado is an excellent, low cholesterol substitute for oil and animal products. We have substituted it for mayo while making some type of a “salad sandwich” or in this recipe we use it instead of highly processed dairy products.

As with all plant-based whole-foods, avocados have antioxidants which help to reduce inflamation. Dr. Gregor has an interesting video on avocados and the potential benefits for protection against various cancers including prostate, colon and esophageal.

In Ontario, we have found that the best place to find avocado for something like this is a frozen bag from Costco. It’s already peeled, pitted and is perfectly ripe every time. Plus, we find it cheaper than buying fresh. Win, win.

Harvard Health Publishing lists many of the foods in this recipe as ones that can help to naturally reduce high blood pressure. These include avocado, dates, almonds and cocoa. If you struggle with high blood pressure, even though Himalayan sea salt is SUPER tasty, consider reducing or cutting it out altogether.

Easy Chocolate Ice Cream Pie

4.50 from 2 votes

A refreshing cold snack for a hot summer day!

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Prep Time 25 minutes mins

Freezing Time 5 hours hrs

Servings: 1 deep pie

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Ingredients Equipment Method

Ingredients

  

Crust

• 2 cups dates
• 1½ cups almonds chopped
• ½ tsp Himalayan sea salt

Filling

• 2 cups mashed avocado about 4 cups frozen chunks
• ½ cup natural peanut butter
• ~½ cup water
• ¾ cup maple syrup
• ⅓ cup cocoa powder
• ½ tsp Himalayan sea salt

Optional

• 2 tsp vanilla

Equipment

• Immersion blender

Method

 

1. Line a deep pie shell with parchment paper (if you only have shallow, you can eat leftover filling like a pudding, or freeze it into fudge sickles!)
2. Chop nuts and hydrated dates either by hand or in a high speed blender with the salt. Mix together until a dough forms and pat it along the bottom and sides of the pie plate.
3. Purée avocado with an immersion blender
4. Add nut butter into a small bowl, slowly add the water while whisking with a fork. Peanut butter is a thirsty legume, while almond butter will require less water, or none at all depending on the brand. It should be a thick pudding texture.
5. Combine the nut butter and all other filling ingredients into the avocado mixture. Blend until smooth. Adjust the flavour by adding more of any of the ingredients, according to your palate preferences.
6. Store in the fridge and consume within 48 hours if you're eating it as a pudding/mousse.

   For ice cream pie, store in the freezer for up to a month in a sealed container. You may need to let it thaw some before cutting into it, depending on your ingredient ratios and how cold your freezer is.

Bon appétit!