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Dandelion ice cream with honey turns a yard full of “weeds” into a rich custard ice cream that tastes like flowers and honey. If dandelion wine is the grown-up way to bottle up spring, this is the version for the kids.
All you need is one cup of dandelion petals, and any pesticide-free lawn should have plenty in April or May.
They’re one of my favorite plants to forage in spring here in Vermont, along with wild violets, plantain, chickweed, and wild asparagus.
Table of Contents
- Notes from My Kitchen
- Why This Recipe Works
- Dandelion Flower or Root?
- Harvesting Dandelion Petals for Ice Cream
- Ingredients for Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream
- How to Make Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream
- Tips for the Best Dandelion Ice Cream
- Dandelion Ice Cream FAQs
- More Dandelion Recipes
- Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream Recipe
- Edible Wild Flower Recipes
Notes from My Kitchen
Dandelion season on our Vermont homestead is short, so the kids and I head out with baskets on the first warm afternoon of spring. We pick until our fingers are stained yellow and we’re sick of pinching off green bases. A cup of petals takes a while to gather, but we look forward to it every year, and the ice cream is the reward.
The first time I made it, the dandelion flavor was much milder than I expected. It doesn’t taste weedy or grassy at all, as long as you get every bit of green off the petals. It’s floral and honey-sweet, somewhere between chamomile and wildflower honey. If you’re serving skeptical guests, don’t tell them what’s in it until they’ve had a bowl.
Why This Recipe Works
Dandelion flowers taste a little like honey, which is why they work so well in dandelion jelly and dandelion mead. You can still taste it in a cream base, and the cream softens any grassy taste.
Honey brings out the flower’s own flavor better than plain sugar. I use a lot less honey than most ice cream recipes use sugar, and it’s still plenty sweet. A light clover honey is just right. Strong honeys like buckwheat or manuka cover up the dandelion, so save those for something else.
It’s a classic French-style custard. You warm the cream with the petals, strain it, then whisk in egg yolks and cook it until it thickens. The yolks keep it soft and scoopable in the freezer for months instead of turning into a brick overnight.
If you’ve never cooked with dandelion petals, this is a good first recipe to try. The ingredient list is short, the custard is simple, and most people have never tasted anything like it. My kids like it better than store-bought vanilla, and the adults who’ve tried it usually ask for the recipe.
It’s one of our favorite dandelion recipes.
Dandelion Flower or Root?
Most dandelion ice cream recipes I’ve seen use roasted dandelion roots instead of the flowers. The book Pacific Feast: A Cook’s Guide to West Coast Foraging and Cuisine has a recipe for roasted dandelion root ice cream. I’d guess it tastes a lot like coffee ice cream, since roasted dandelion roots make a good wild coffee substitute. This one is different.
Dandelion blossoms taste nothing like dandelion roots. They taste faintly of honey, which is why they’re so good in summertime dandelion jelly, simple dandelion syrup, and ice cream. I skip the sugar here and sweeten it with a light clover honey, which brings out the flower flavor instead of covering it up.
Harvesting Dandelion Petals for Ice Cream
Dandelions are one of the first edible wild flowers of the year, and they’re easy to find. Pick them where nothing’s been sprayed, and stay away from roadsides, where runoff and exhaust settle on the flowers. Your own unsprayed lawn or an organic pasture is a good place to start.
Pick on a sunny, dry day, when the flowers are wide open and the petals pull out easily. Morning, after the dew has dried, is a good time to pick. If you’re new to foraging, start with my full dandelion foraging guide and my guide to identifying true dandelions and avoiding their look-alikes. A few plants, like cat’s ear and hawkweed, have similar yellow flowers. While most of the common look-alikes are also edible, true dandelions give you the flavor this recipe is built around.
Once you have a bowl of flowers, the petals need to come off the green base. This is the tedious part. Pinch the yellow petals with one hand and twist the green part away with the other, and the petals come off in a little tuft. Get every scrap of green off, or the ice cream will taste bitter.
The green parts have a bitter, milky sap, and a little goes a long way. Take your time, put on a podcast, and get the kids to help. You need one packed cup of petals for a batch.
I split each flower in half from top to bottom, then pull the petals out and leave the green behind. Everyone has their own way of doing it, and this is mine.
Ingredients for Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream
The ingredient list is short on purpose, so the dandelion and honey come through.
- Dandelion petals: Fresh yellow petals only, with all the green removed. One packed cup makes a batch, and more can make it taste grassy.
- Heavy cream: Full fat, and not ultra-pasteurized if you can find it. The fat is what makes the ice cream rich.
- Whole milk: All cream makes a heavy ice cream. Mixing in some milk gives it body without being too rich.
- Honey: A light honey like clover or wildflower. Raw honey is lovely here. Dark honeys like buckwheat will drown out the dandelion.
- Egg yolks: The yolks make it a true French-style custard, which stays soft and scoopable for months. Save the whites for meringues.
- Sea salt: A little salt balances the sweetness and brings out the dandelion.
How to Make Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream
There are three steps: infuse the cream, cook the custard, and churn. Give yourself most of a day. The custard chills for at least 4 hours before it goes in the ice cream maker, and the ice cream firms up in the freezer for 2 to 3 hours after.
Step 1: Infuse the Cream
Put the cream, milk, honey, salt, and dandelion petals in a medium saucepan. Warm it slowly over medium-low heat, stirring now and then, just until it barely simmers. As soon as you see small bubbles around the edge, pull it off the heat so it doesn’t boil over or scorch.
Cover the pot and let the petals steep for at least 30 minutes. I often let mine go 40 to 45 minutes for more flavor. Past an hour, it starts to taste a bit grassy, so that’s my limit.
Step 2: Strain and Cook the Custard
Pour the cream through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl or measuring cup, pressing on the petals to get every drop. Toss the spent petals. Rinse the saucepan in cool water, since a hot pan will scramble the egg yolks.
Put the egg yolks in the cooled pan. Whisk constantly while you pour in the warm cream in a thin stream. This is called tempering, and it warms the yolks slowly so they don’t scramble.
Once all the cream is in, turn the heat to low and keep whisking. It’ll thicken over 3 to 5 minutes. It’s done when it coats the back of a spoon and holds a line when you run your finger through it. With an instant-read thermometer, you’re looking for 175°F (79°C). Don’t let it go above 180°F, or the eggs will start to scramble.
Step 3: Chill and Churn
Pour the hot custard into a heatproof bowl and press plastic wrap or parchment right onto the surface so it doesn’t form a skin. Chill it in the fridge for at least 4 hours, or overnight. It has to be cold all the way through, or it won’t churn properly.
Pour the cold custard into your ice cream maker and churn it the way the manufacturer says, usually 20 to 30 minutes. When it looks like soft serve, move it to a freezer-safe container, press parchment onto the surface, and freeze it 2 to 3 hours to firm up.
Tips for the Best Dandelion Ice Cream
Here’s what helps this ice cream turn out smooth and mild.
- Remove every bit of green. I can’t say this enough. The milky sap in the green parts is bitter, and a few green bits can spoil the whole batch. Work over a light-colored bowl so you can spot any green that slips through.
- Use a mild honey. Clover, wildflower, and orange blossom honey all work well. Dark honeys cover up the dandelion.
- Don’t skip the chilling step. Warm custard won’t churn into proper ice cream. An ice bath speeds it up a little, but give it at least 4 hours in the fridge for a smooth ice cream.
- No ice cream maker? No problem. I’ve made this with just a KitchenAid mixer. Freeze the cold custard in a freezer-safe container, and every 2 hours, take it out and beat it with the paddle, or stir it really well by hand. Do that 3 or 4 times, and it won’t freeze into a rock. It stays light, like ice cream.
- Make it dairy-free. Use whatever non-dairy ice cream recipe already works for you, and add the dandelion infusing step at the start. Coconut cream works well, and its faint flavor goes nicely with the dandelion.
- Serve it with a honey drizzle. A little raw honey on top, and maybe a candied dandelion petal if you’re feeling fancy, makes it nice enough for a spring dinner party.
Dandelion Ice Cream FAQs
It tastes floral and a little like honey, a lot like chamomile or wildflower honey. It isn’t grassy or weedy, as long as you get all the green parts off the flowers.
Yes! I’ve made it with just a KitchenAid mixer. Freeze the cold custard, take it out every 2 hours, and beat it with the paddle or stir it really well by hand. Do that 3 or 4 times, and it stays light like ice cream instead of freezing into a rock.
It keeps 2 to 3 months in the freezer, and the egg yolks keep it soft and scoopable. Press parchment right onto the surface before you put the lid on, so ice crystals don’t form.
Bitterness almost always comes from bits of the green base or stem. The green parts have a bitter, milky sap, and even a little can spoil the batch. Take your time and get every bit of green off before the petals go in the cream.
I don’t recommend it. Cooking the custard to 175°F thickens it and kills any harmful bacteria in the eggs. It also makes a smoother, more scoopable ice cream than a raw egg version.
More Dandelion Recipes
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Dandelion & Honey Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 2 cups heavy cream
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1/2 cup honey, light, like clover
- 1 cup dandelion petals, packed, yellow parts only
- 1 pinch sea salt
- 6 large egg yolks
Instructions
- Put the cream, milk, honey, salt, and dandelion petals in a medium saucepan. Warm it slowly over medium-low heat, stirring now and then, just until it barely simmers, then take it off the heat.
- Cover the pot and let the petals steep for at least 30 minutes, and no more than 1 hour.
- Pour the cream through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl or measuring cup, pressing on the petals. Rinse the saucepan in cool water, since a hot pan will scramble the egg yolks.
- Put the egg yolks in the cooled pan. Whisk constantly while you pour in the warm cream in a thin stream.
- Turn the heat to low and keep whisking until the custard coats the back of a spoon and reaches 175°F (79°C) on an instant-read thermometer, 3 to 5 minutes. Don’t let it go above 180°F.
- Pour the custard into a heatproof bowl, press plastic wrap or parchment onto the surface, and chill it in the fridge for at least 4 hours, or overnight.
- Churn it in an ice cream maker the way the manufacturer says, usually 20 to 30 minutes. Move it to a freezer-safe container, press parchment onto the surface, and freeze it 2 to 3 hours to firm up.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
If you caught the foraged ice cream bug, try my chanterelle ice cream in late summer and acorn ice cream in fall to round out the foraging calendar.
Edible Wild Flower Recipes
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Hi Ashley! Question for you. I have some dandelion wine that I made, could that be used in this recipe instead of the new picked petals? Just a thought rather than pick new ones if I already have the flavor in the wine.
I don’t think it’d work, though I haven’t tried it . Wine is acidic, and I think if you add enough to give it flavor, you’d curdle the cream. If it didn’t curdle the cream, you’d end up with something that’s more like sorbet because it has so much water in it. Though alcohol doesn’t freeze, so that may or may not help you with ice crystal formation. I guess what I’m saying is, it might may cheese, it might not freeze right, and it won’t have a strong dandelion flavor…but that’s a guess. It might work?
Personally, I wouldn’t risk my dandelion wine on it (that’s hard to make) and instead I’d just pick a handful of dandelion flowers for this recipe. It’s only a few dandelions for ice cream, as opposed to the buckets of them for wine. But if you do try it, let me know how it goes, I’m curious now.
Anxious to try . I may try to print in booklet
Thanks for sharing! Does it keep long?
It actually keeps incredibly well in the freezer and even stays soft and scoopable.
This looks so good! What a great combination of flavors!
Hey, after letting the dandelions infuse for about 40 minutes, the preparation came out really bitter. I am surprised because i made sure there was no green part in there and just the yellow part. As I can’t have diary I’ve used non lactose milk and tofu cream. What do you think ?
I’m assuming that you turned the heat off when you were doing the infusion? If so and you only had the yellow petals, then my only guess would be that it has something to do with the milk and cream that you used. I can’t say for certain because I haven’t ever tried it with that before.
Just one question. is it safe to put totally raw eggs and eat it? or did i read the recipe wrong? i made it how i interpreted it and it tastes great but now i’m worried of contacting any foodborne illnesses.
You are adding the heated cream to the eggs which might be enough to cook the eggs but if not, you need to add it back to the stove and cook very slowly until the mixture is 175 degrees Fahrenheit.
what is the yield?
I haven’t exactly measured it out but going off of the measurements from the recipe, it should be somewhere around 4 cups.
Great ice cream! My husband bought 18% cream instead of full cream and half & half. I see now that we could have used the full cream/milk combo. Really flavourful. Nice yellow colour!
Great ice cream! My husband bought 18% cream instead of full cream and half & half. I see now that we could have used the full cream/milk combo. Really flavourful. Nice yellow colour!
THANKS YOU FOR ALL
Hi Ashley, I am in Australia and I do not know what “half & half” is. Could you please tell me what that product is? The ice-cream sounds divine, but we cannot have dairy, so I normally substitute the milk for coconut cream. If the “half & half” is a dairy product of some kind, could you please recommend a non-dairy alternative? Thanks, Kelia xxx
Sure! Half and half is a common dairy preparation here in the US, it’s just basically half milk and half cream together and it’s mostly used for either creaming coffee or making ice cream. A simpler version of this recipe would be 2 cups heavy cream and 1 cup milk for all the dairy in this recipe. You can use whatever non-dairy substitute you usually use in making dairy-free ice cream. Really, you can use whatever ice cream recipe you want, just infuse the dandelion petals into it at the start. So if you have a recipe that works for you as a non-dairy version, make that and just add a dandelion infusing step. Good luck, I hope it’s delicious!
Thanks Ashley for explaining that. Yes I will definitely make this ice-cream, using coconut cream instead of dairy cream & milk. I have been adding Dandelion to so many of my recipes, & had not thought to try it in my homemade ice-cream. Thanks for the inspiration. Kelia xxx
Sounds delicious! Does anyone know if there a way to make this type of ice cream without an ice cream maker? Can we freeze the mixture in the bowl and call it good? I’d rather not go out and buy an ice cream maker – it’s just my husband and I and we don’t eat that much ice cream.
Thanks in advance for suggestions.
Yes! I’ve made this ice cream using just a kitchenaid mixer. Take it out of the freezer every 2 hours and beat it with the paddle blade (or just stir it really good by hand). Then it won’t freeze into a rock and stays light like ice cream.
Hi There,
If you don’t have an ice cream maker you take it out and use a kitchen aid to mix it every two hours for how long? How many cycles? Every time I’ve made ice cream it’s rock hard and not scoopable. This looks so good. I want to get it right!
You can just keep doing that until it is the correct consistency and then freeze it. I have had several recipes do just like you described but I made this recipe for Easter and there is actually still a little bit left in the freezer and is still incredibly soft and scoopable.
I was so THRILLED to find this article. I can’t wait till Spring.
I was so THRILLED to find this article. I can’t wait till Spring.