Dairy Free Chocolate Banana Ice 'Cream'

Everyone once in awhile you make a recipe that makes you go 'meh'. This is that recipe. I found it on Pinterest and despite a gazillion repins popping up in my feed daily, it's one of these items that is better left as an idea. 

First off, let me preface that if you're vegan, you might love this recipe. But for me it doesn't come close to the real thing. Also, if I was vegan I'd probably just have sorbet. It didn't scoop into a nice round ball like the pictures on Pinterest. I even gave it a minute or two to soften. Truthfully I gave it an hour and it was still hard as a rock. And for me, it was too 'melty' to eat before it went in the freezer. It also tasted like frozen bananas with cocoa powder. Which is basically all it is, but I think I somehow expected the addition of cocoa powder and peanut butter to transform it? 

Oh well. No tips today as I'm not sure what could have been done to save this recipe. I hope that the yogurt covered blueberries I've been coveting on Pinterest are not as much of a disappointment.

The recipe is below, please comment if you sort how to make it better. Maybe more peanut butter?

Single Ingredient Ice Cream

4 bananas, just slightly overripe (brown spots good, completely black not so good)
2 tbsps creamy peanut butter (optional – thus 2 ingredient ice cream)
2 tsps cocoa powder (Dutch process), (optional – thus 2 or 3 ingredient ice cream depending on peanut butter)

DO NOT FREEZE THE WHOLE BANANA, you’ll have a heck of a time blending that beast.

Peel the bananas and slice them up into 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick disks. Place the banana slices in the freezer for about an hour or until they are frozen solid. Put the frozen slices in a food processor and pulse. First they will start to resemble gravel, but keep going. The bananas will soon turn into a frozen mush – at this point, start scraping the sides down (you will do this a lot). Or you could add a dash of milk since the liquid will help the blending. I’m lactose-intolerant, so after a few minutes of stopping to scrape the sides down, the banana begins to blend into a creamy texture. When the bananas look like whipped ice cream, you can add your mix-ins like peanut butter and/or cocoa powder, chocolate chips, toffee, raspberries, anything goes! Straight out of the food processor, the ice cream is like soft serve. You can also freeze it for a firmer texture. I find it’s pretty hard (and therefore, brittle) when I scoop it immediately after removing it from the freezer. Just give it a minute or two to soften up. Makes a pint.