Lactose Free Ice Cream

Who doesn't love ice cream? Well, I know! People who suffer from lactose intolerance and those who are allergic to milk and milk products. It is not that they don't like ice cream, but they simply cannot have ice cream owing to the numerous health related consequences that they may have to suffer from. No matter what, it is really hard to give up on ice cream and hence the best escape that such allergic people can find is in the form of lactose free ice cream. Keeping this dilemma in mind, many ice cream brands have introduced special ice cream flavors that do not contain lactose. Keep reading the following article and get to know more about them. But, first of all, let's get to know more about lactose and its effects.

Lactose and Its Complications

Apart from other ice cream ingredients, milk and milk products are the essential ingredients that you need to make those delicious ice creams. Milk is the only natural source of lactose, since around 2 to 8% of milk contains lactose. Lactose is a simple carbohydrate which is made of two simple sugars glucose and galactose. Lactose intolerance is a medical condition which is developed by lactase deficiency. Lactase is an enzyme which is present in our digestive system and it plays the main role in digesting dairy products. Lack of lactase results into various lactose intolerance symptoms like diarrhea, bloating, stomach cramps, etc. Sometimes, milk allergy is considered as lactose intolerance. Milk allergy, on the other hand is basically the condition wherein the person is allergy to milk proteins like casein and whey protein. However in both the cases, patients are advised to avoid food products that are made of milk or any milk products. Hence, all the milk products from their diet are replaced by a healthy dairy free diet. One can say that lactose free ice cream is also a part of a dairy free diet that you can try.

Easy Recipes

You can make numerous ice cream recipes, with help of a few easily available ice cream ingredients. You can easily make any fat free, lactose free ice cream recipe at home with any of your favorite ice cream flavors. Here are a few examples.

Recipe # 1
Ingredients

• Bananas 3 to 4
• Dried cranberries, peaches or any other dry fruits, ½ cup
• Fresh fruit mix, 1 cup
• Almonds or Macadamia nuts, ½ cup
• Honey or agave syrup, ½ to 1 cup
• Mixed spice, ½ teaspoon
• Freshly grated orange rind, 1 teaspoon
• Almond milk, 2 cups

Direction
Combine all the above ingredients and whizz them thoroughly in a food processor. You can either blend them fine or leave them coarse to get that texture. Pour the mixture in a glass bowl and combine it and freeze it for about 2 to 3 hours. Remove the bowl out of the freezer and blend the batter well before putting it back in the fridge for 2 to 3 hours more. Repeat the procedure for two more times and freeze it for the last time. Your lactose free fruit and nut ice cream is ready! If almond milk is not available, then you can also use soy milk with cream or rice milk.

Recipe # 2
Ingredients

• Lactose free milk, 1 ¼ cups
• gelatin, 2 tablespoons
• Caster sugar ½ cup
• Vanilla extract, 1 teaspoon
• Lactose free cream 1 ¼ cups

Direction
First of all, add gelatin to 2 tablespoons of boiling water and keep it aside. Now, mix milk, gelatin and sugar in a large saucepan. Place it over low heat and stir well, until the sugar dissolves. Once the mixture gets cool, add vanilla extract to it and stir again. Pour the mixture in a bowl and freeze it for about 2 to 3 hours. In the meanwhile, beat the cream for about 10 minutes. Add both the mixtures in the ice cream machine and mix them well. Freeze it for the final time for about 6 to 8 hours (or overnight). Your lactose free, homemade vanilla ice cream, is ready!

Lactose Free Ice Cream Brands

When you search for no dairy ice cream, you will surely come across a few ice cream brands that do not contain milk or milk products. Milk based ice cream ingredients in these brands are replaced by lactose free soy milk, almond milk, rice milk or coconut milk. Here is a list of some good ice cream brands that are lactose free.

• Lactaid Ice Creams
• Breyers' Lactose-Free Ice Cream
• LaLoo's Goat's Milk Ice Cream
• Rice Dream Organic Lactose Free Ice Cream
• Luna & Larry's Coconut Bliss Chocolate Hazelnut Fudge
• Organic So Delicious Dairy Free Mocha Fudge
• Good Karma Organic Rice Divine Mint Chocolate Swirl
• Turtle Mountain Purely Decadent Dairy Free Cookie Dough
• Turtle Mountain Purely Decadent Coconut Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Swirl
• Chapman's No Sugar Added Ice Cream
• Booja-Booja Stuff in a Tub Hunky Punky
• Nondairy Ice Cream

As a parting note, I would advise you to check the label of the ice cream to check if it does not contain lactose or any other milk product in any form.