Vegan lemon ice cream - this delicious ice cream is easy to make, smooth, creamy and so refreshing! The flavour is zingy and lemony, swirl it with homemade vegan lemon curd for an even bigger lemon hit!
It also contains NO coconut! The secret ingredient to it's wonderful creamy texture is oats!
This vegan lemon ice cream is based on my delicious vegan vanilla ice cream recipe, which uses a base of cooked oats and cashews rather than coconut.
This gives it a more neutral flavour, meaning that whatever you decide to flavour your ice cream with doesn't have to compete with the coconut to shine.
It is also a great base recipe which can easily be adapted to create all sorts of different flavours.
This lemon version is ultra refreshing, with a zingy, fresh flavour and a creamy texture. It might just be my favourite ice cream I've ever made!
It is even better mixed with a swirl of homemade vegan lemon curd!
What Do I Need To Make Vegan Lemon Ice Cream?:
Lemons: You will need both lemon zest and juice so make sure that you buy unwaxed lemons. I wouldn't recommend making this ice cream with bottled lemon juice, it won't taste as good.
Lemon extract: This is optional but adding a bit of lemon extract helps to ramp up the lemon flavour.
Cashews: Unroasted cashews provide creaminess to this vegan lemon ice cream. They need to be soaked so they are soft enough to blend up to a smooth cream. You can either soak them in boiling water for about an hour, or in cold water overnight.
Porridge oats: regular rolled porridge oats or quick cooking ones are fine. You are going to simmer them with some plant milk until they are soft before blending them.
Plant milk: unsweetened soy milk is the best option here as it has a neutral flavour and creamy texture. (I like Alpro Unsweetened Soya milk the best).
You can use any kind of plant milk you like but bear in mind that the flavour of the milk will affect the flavour of the ice cream.
Caster sugar: I use white caster sugar (granulated is fine too) as it has a neutral flavour, I want the lemon to be the star here! You can swap it for maple syrup or agave if you want but then your ice cream will taste like maple.
Don't reduce the amount of sugar by much or the ice cream won't be as creamy and it won't taste as good.
Oil: Adding a bit of fat to the ice cream helps keep the texture rich, smooth and creamy. Cocoa butter gives it a hint of white chocolate flavour, but if you want pure lemon then use refined coconut oil (not virgin or it will taste like coconut) or something neutral flavoured such as sunflower..
You can omit the fat if you want but the ice cream won't be quite as creamy.
Xanthan gum: Pretty much all commercial ice creams contain some sort of stabiliser such as guar gum. This helps to stop the ingredients from separating and keeps the ice cream smooth and creamy.
Because guar gum is not so easy to get hold of, I used xanthan gum which is sold in most supermarkets and does the same job. You can just omit it if you can’t get hold of it.
Vodka: This is totally optional but a bit of alcohol helps stop the ice cream from freezing too solid (it will still be quite firm straight out the freezer however).
Salt: A little bit of salt really helps to bring out the flavour and balance the sweetness.
How To Make Vegan Lemon Ice Cream:
(Full measurements and instructions can be found in the recipe card at the bottom of the page)
Make sure that the bowl of your ice cream maker has been in the freezer for long enough, mine takes 11 hours to fully freeze.
You need to soak the cashews so that they are soft enough to blend to a smooth cream. Either cover them with plenty of boiling water and leave to soak for an hour, or cover with cold water and leave to soak overnight.
Place the porridge oats in a saucepan with half of the soy milk and bring to a gentle simmer, cook for about 10 minutes, stirring often to prevent the bottom from catching, until the oats are soft.
Drain the soaked cashews well then place them in a blender with the other half of the milk and the lemon zest and blitz until smooth.
Add the cooked oat mixture to the blender along with the lemon juice, sugar, lemon extract, oil, xanthan gum, salt and vodka and blend until the mixture is very smooth.
Pour into a bowl, cover and refrigerate until completely cold.
Once the ice cream mixture is thoroughly chilled, give it a good whisk then pour it into your ice cream maker and churn until it reaches soft serve consistency.
Once the ice cream is done churning, transfer it to a freezer-proof container, swirling it with spoonfuls of lemon curd if you want, and freeze for about 4 hours, until firm, before serving.
What If I Don’t Own An Ice Cream Maker?:
If you don’t have an ice cream maker you can still make this ice cream, it just takes a bit more work and the texture may be a bit more icy.
Once the base is chilled, pour it into a large freezerproof container and pop it in the freezer. Every 30 minutes or so, remove it from the freezer and give it a quick whisk with an electric mixer to break up any ice crystals then return it to the freezer.
Repeat this until it reaches soft-serve consistency then allow to freeze for a couple of hours before serving.
Top Tips:
As with all of my recipes I really do recommend using the metric measurements with a digital scale rather than the cup conversions. Cups are a wildly inaccurate measuring system and you will get far better, more consistent results using a scale, not to mention that it is also easier and less messy than cups!
This ice cream is quite solid straight out of the freezer so make sure that you take it out at least 15 minutes before serving to allow it to soften up a little.
Ideally you need a power blender (such as Froothie/Vitamix) for the smoothest ice cream. You can still make it with a regular blender, but it might not be quite as smooth and creamy.
I recommend making the ice cream base the day before you churn it so that it has time to properly chill first. It needs to be cold when it goes into the ice cream maker.
It is optional but I highly, highly recommend making a ½ batch of my vegan lemon curd and swirling the churned ice cream with dollops of it. Make the curd the day before you intend to churn the ice cream.
More Vegan Ice Cream Recipes:
- Vegan vanilla ice cream
- Vegan malted chocolate ice cream
- Vegan mint choc chip ice cream
- Vegan coffee ice cream with chocolate swirl
- Vegan pistachio ice cream
- Rich and creamy vegan chocolate ice cream
- Vegan peanut butter and cookies ice cream
- Vegan biscoff ice cream
- Vegan chunky monkey ice cream
- Vegan chocolate coconut sorbet
If you tried this recipe let me know how it went! Rate it, leave a comment or tag @domestic_gothess on Instagram and hashtag it #domesticgothess
All images and content on Domestic Gothess are copyright protected. If you want to share this recipe then please do so by using the share buttons provided. Do not screenshot or post the recipe or content in full.
Vegan Lemon ice Cream
Ingredients
- 150 g (1 cup) unroasted cashews
- 25 g (¼ cup) porridge oats (rolled oats)
- 650 ml (2 + ⅔ cup) unsweetened non-dairy milk (I use soy)
- finely grated zest of 2 large lemons
- 150 ml (½ cup + 2 Tablespoons) lemon juice
- 180 g (¾ cup + 2 rounded Tablespoons) caster or granulated sugar
- 3 Tablespoons melted refined coconut oil, cocoa butter or neutral oil
- ⅛ teaspoon xanthan gum (optional)
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon lemon extract
- 2 Tablespoons vodka (optional)
- ½ batch vegan lemon curd (optional)
Instructions
- Make sure that the bowl of your ice cream maker has been in the freezer for long enough, mine takes 11 hours to fully freeze. Ideally you should make the ice cream base and the lemon curd the day before you want to churn the ice cream.
- You need to soak the cashews so that they are soft enough to blend to a smooth cream. Either cover them with plenty of boiling water and leave to soak for an hour, or cover with cold water and leave to soak overnight.
- Place the porridge oats in a saucepan with half of the soy milk and bring to a gentle simmer, cook for about 10 minutes, stirring often to prevent the bottom from catching, until the oats are soft.
- Drain the soaked cashews well then place them in a blender with the other half of the milk and the lemon zest and blitz until smooth.
- Add the cooked oat mixture to the blender along with the lemon juice, sugar, lemon extract, oil, xanthan gum, salt and vodka (if using) and blend until the mixture is very smooth.
- Pour into a bowl, cover and refrigerate until completely cold; I leave mine in there overnight but it will take at least four hours.
- Once the ice cream mixture is thoroughly chilled, give it a good whisk then pour it into your ice cream maker and churn until it reaches soft serve consistency.
- If you are using the lemon curd, give it a good stir to loosen up the consistency.
- Spread half of the churned ice cream over a freezer-proof container. Dollop spoonfuls of the lemon curd on top. Spoon the rest of the ice cream on top and spoon over more lemon curd (you won't need all of it). Use the back of a knife to very gently swirl the lemon curd into the ice cream.
- Freeze for about 4 hours, until firm, before serving.
Shanese
This turned out so well!!
I loved the overall texture of this. And the addition of the oats really helped with the smoothness.
I didn't have about 20ml of lemon juice, so added in a little lime juice. If I had enough lemons, I would've made the curd but honestly it tastes great, as is!
Thank you for sharing this recipe, it will most certainly be made again~