Cultured Strawberry Ice Cream: Probiotic-Rich!!

Cultured Strawbery Ice Cream: Probiotic-Rich!! (B.E.D. Friendly, stage 2)

Tara Carpenter, NC.

Holistic nutrition for people of all ages healing a yeast, bacterial, or viral infection with The Body Ecology Diet (B.E.D.).

One hot summer morning, I woke to see out our window several red strawberries in our garden. My immediate thought was “strawberry ice cream for breakfast!” The kids loved the idea (of course…) and responded with joyful glee, a splattering of kisses on my cheek, and spins of delight 🙂

I had cultured cream* in the fridge and the boys picked berries to make the recipe you can find below. I usually wait to go public until I make a recipe 3 times (more like 30), yet the result is decent enough and summer short!

When cream is cultured with a starter* before churning, it essentially becomes a pre-digested food, meaning the milk protein (casein) is broken down by the probiotics in the starter, plus the milk sugar (lactose) is converted into lactic acid … all very healthy for the gut. These steps make an otherwise dense food, much easier-to-digest and probiotic-rich too. 

Cream in the cultured form is often tolerated by those with lactose intolerance. That said, if you are on a gut protocol, like The Body Ecology Diet (B.E.D.), you may want to eliminate all dairy for the initial 3 months of your healing. This will allow the gul mucosal lining time to renew itself and for enzymatic activity to get going again.

Sweeten Up

I use stevia because this natural sweetener will not feed excess pathogenic microorganisms living in your body. Stevia also does not affect blood sugar and so ideal for those with diabetes or yeast overgrowth. 

Life is like ice cream, enjoy before melts!

Cultured Strawberry Ice cream (B.E.D. Friendly, stage 2)

Serves: 4

Ingredients

2 cups (480 ml) cultured whipping cream

1-2 fresh, raw egg yolks (pasture-raised)

½ teaspoon (2 ml) vanilla extract

½ teaspoon (2-3 ml) liquid stevia extract or 3/4 teaspoon (4 grams) green stevia powder

Pinch of sea salt

Handful of strawberries

Method

1. Place all ingredients, except the berries, into blender and mix well.
2. Add to ice cream maker, along with strawberries, and process according to the directions of your ice cream maker.
3. Enjoy as is or transfer to a bowl for freezing.

Tips & Tricks

• Careful with stevia, adding too much will turn the ice cream bitter.
• We rarely eat sugar, so if you have a sweet tooth you might want to adjust the amount of sweetener.
• Ice cream is forgiving and lends well to variations; add roasted almonds, or a splash of alcohol-free orange extract.
• If you don’t have an ice cream maker, you can use a mixing bowl: then pour in ingredients, cover with plastic wrap, place in freezer for 1 hour until mixture freezes at edges, stir, freeze for 1 hour more. At 2-hour mark, blend and freeze until firm enough to stay in bowl, but soft enough to dip into (about 6 hours total).

*Use a culture starter that contains high-quality probiotics, particularly Lb. Plantarum – one of the heartiest strains you can put in your body. Most probiotics get destroyed by antibiotics, fluoride, stomach acid, chlorinated water, etc. before reaching the small intestine, yet Lb. Plantarum is strong enough to survive and keep your gut full of good flora. This is the starter I like to use.

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May all bellies be happy!