Vegan Ice Cream Base

This plant-based ice cream base has the same satisfying creaminess and a texture that holds up in the freezer.

If you just want the base recipe you’re welcome to skip to the bottom, my R&D notes are included for the science nerds among us.

Recipe goals

I’m not looking to make the most accessible vegan ice cream recipe, I’m trying to make the best version of a vegan ice cream that’s achievable at home. There’s a good chance you’ll need to order some of the ingredients online, unless your pantry is already equipped for molecular gastronomy experiments.

I set off referencing Underbelly’s vegan ice cream and the vegan base from Adrienne Borlongan’s book Wanderlust Creamery Presents: The World of Ice Cream as my starting points to understand the science of vegan ice cream.

Ingredients

A common thread between the recipes is the use of a sugar blend, stabilizers, and added solids to achieve the ideal texture. My mix of sugars and stabilizers are different from the two recipes I referenced, but the underlying logic is similar.

I’m starting with Halle’s instant oat milk recipe from her book Call Me Vegan, and opted to use pistachios for the nut component. Underbelly’s article on the fat emulsion of ice cream provided helpful guidance on determining a mix of fats for the ideal mouthfeel and structure.

Every component in this recipe plays a distinct role—not just in flavor, but in texture, scoopability, and stability. Here’s a closer look at the role of each ingredient:

• Unsweetened Oat Milk
  This forms the creamy base of our ice cream. Oat milk is relatively neutral and high in solids, which helps with mouthfeel and body. Borlongan recommends using pea milk for a more neutral flavor base.
• Refined Coconut Oil
  This is solid at room temperature, which contributes to the sensation of richness and a melt-in-your-mouth creamy texture. Refined coconut oil is more neutral in flavor than virgin coconut oil.
• Roasted Pistachio Oil
  Beyond lending a toasty, nutty depth of flavor, pistachio oil is a liquid fat that prevents the ice cream from leaning too waxy.
• Dextrose
  A less-sweet sugar with powerful freezing point depression, dextrose is crucial for keeping the ice cream soft and scoopable straight from the freezer.
• Sucrose
  Regular table sugar balances sweetness and works in tandem with dextrose to control texture and freezing point.
• Kosher Salt
  Just a pinch heightens all the other flavors and keeps the sweetness from becoming cloying.
• Carboxymethyl Cellulose (AKA cellulose gum AKA CMC)
  This cold-soluble stabilizer adds body and reduces iciness by helping the mix retain water during freezing.
• Guar Gum
  A natural thickener, guar gum improves texture and adds body so the mix is more akin to a dairy custard.
• Soy Lecithin
  This emulsifier helps bind fat and water, preventing separation and enhancing creaminess throughout the churn.
• Inulin
  Inulin is chicory root fiber, often sold as a dietary supplement. Inulin adds subtle sweetness, improves creaminess, and increases total solids.

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The method

Heat (or lack thereof)

Much like cooked oatmeal, homemade oat milk will gelatinize into a thick, pudding-like consistency when heated. Recipe tests 1 and 2 resulted in thick, gloopy bases that were too cloying when they melted on the tongue.

I switched my approach from replicating a high-fat dairy based ice cream with plant-based fats to first making an oat milk sorbet then factoring in the fat. I typically avoid using cellulose gum (CMC) with dairy ice creams since it’s not compatible with the proteins. In this application, dairy proteins aren’t an issue so I take advantage of CMC’s powerful ice crystal suppression, cold hydration, and minimal effect on the viscosity of the mix.

Homogenization & Fat Amalgamation

When I asked Tyler Malek from Salt & Straw about formulating vegan ice creams he mentioned the importance of homogenization. Homogenization is a mechanical process that breaks down fat globules in a liquid into smaller, uniformly distributed particles. It prevents separation and ensures emulsion stability. We want to achieve an effect called fat amalgamation, which is the merging of small fat droplets into a cohesive fat network. In vegan ice creams, the solid fat from coconut oil can crystallize to form those networks.

A high speed homogenizer is the ideal tool for the job, but an affordable consumer option just doesn’t exist in the US. A blender doesn’t achieve this as well as a commercial homogenizer since the blades can’t create a uniform high-pressure shear and it generates heat. That said, a home blender is still my best bet.

Aging

You can’t rush perfection and it couldn’t be more true with this ice cream base. I tried to cheat the process and skip the aging step in one of my tests and the difference was huge. The unaged base was denser and greasier feeling after churning. So what happens to the ice cream base when you let it sit in the fridge overnight?

• Hydrates stabilizers and emulsifiersIngredients like CMC, guar gum, and soy lecithin need time to fully hydrate and disperse in the mix. This ensures they can do their jobs like reducing iciness, binding fat and water, and improving texture without clumping.
• Boosts creaminess and bodyBy allowing the inulin and starches in oat milk to fully hydrate and swell, aging enhances the body and scoopability of the ice cream, mimicking the dense texture of dairy-based versions.
• Improves emulsion Over time, the fat droplets (from coconut and pistachio oil) more thoroughly emulsify into the water phase, especially with the help of lecithin.
• Builds structurePartial coalescence is when some fat droplets partially clump together but don’t fully merge into one mass (that would be butter). This process happens during aging and churning and is essential in ice cream for building structure and trapping air.

Churning

Once aged and chilled, the mix is ready to churn, This is where the final structure of the ice cream is built. During churning, three things happen simultaneously:

• Air is incorporated
• Ice crystals form
• Fat droplets undergo partial coalescence

Vegan ice cream can be trickier to churn than dairy-based mixes because plant fats don’t behave the same way. But thanks to aging, our coconut oil has had time to crystallize, and our stabilizers and emulsifiers are fully hydrated. Together, this allows the fat to partially clump in a way that mimics the texture-building of dairy fat.

If your churned base looks too soft, don’t panic, it will firm up in the freezer. Just be sure to transfer it quickly to a container and freeze for at least 4 hours.

Variation: Pistachioat Milk Matcha Latte Flavor

I used pistachios in the homemade oat milk and roasted pistachio oil in the base. I continue through step 3, then split the mix into two equal portions (about 470g each). I used an immersion blender to incorporate 9g matcha powder into one portion before continuing to age and churn each half of the base separately.

Vegan ice cream base stats

Total mix: 944.5g
Fat: 13.9% (assumes 1% fat in oat milk)
Relative sweetness (POD): 168
PAC: 327 (-16.4°C serving temperature)
Total solids: 42.8% (assumes 10% solids in oat milk)