This Vegan Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream is dairy-free and made from fruit and natural unrefined sugar! Healthy and made with cashews, yogurt and coconut milk!
VEGAN BLUEBERRY CHEESECAKE ICE CREAM
I’ve been sitting on this recipe for about a month and am excited to share it today. I shared a teaser pic on Facebook and my goodness, I had no idea how excited you would all get over blueberries….ok, who am I kidding, it’s the fact it is ice cream, let’s be real.
I love it when I can take 2 of my favorite cream cheese flavors on this blog and combine them into ICE CREAM. That is just what I did with today’s recipe. This recipe was inspired after my recent Strawberry Cream Cheese recipe and my original Blueberry Cream Cheese recipe. I combined both of those to create not just a blueberry ice cream, but a blueberry cheesecake ice cream. Oh my goodness, one word….delicious.
TANGY AND CREAMY FOR THAT CHEESECAKE FLAVOR
The yogurt and lemon juice help to give it extra tang and body, so that it doesn’t just taste like frozen blueberries. Now, I didn’t use strawberries in this recipe…that wasn’t the inspirational part from that cream cheese…it was the yogurt! Yogurt flat out gives such amazing body and tang to everything. And remember, it was the one of the magic ingredients in the Cheesy Mexican Tortilla Bake. However, several had trouble finding “plain” yogurt, but guess what, this one you can use sweetened or vanilla or even plain and should be totally fine.
Speaking of, I almost wished I had saved that Cheesy Mexican Tortilla Bake for my cookbook!! I guess I still possibly could put it in there since I’m putting some of the most popular, hmmm, we will see. I knew it was delicious, but the response has been phenomenal and more than I expected. Could it possibly surpass the Garlic Alfredo #1 spot for all of these years?! Hahahahaha. It has been made easily by over a hundred of you and it’s been a joy to read all of the wonderful comments on that post saying your non-vegan husbands and non-vegan kids/teenagers are scarfing it down. Soooo, if you haven’t made it yet, DO IT.
BLUEBERRY AND GRAPE VEGAN ICE CREAM
Back to this Vegan Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream.
A little surprising ingredient that you’ll notice above…to further amp up the natural sweetness and flavor of the ice cream, I added black grapes! The black grapes give an additional boost of color as well. I felt the blueberries alone made it too light of a color that I wanted. It was like gray, lol. But when I added the black grapes, it gave it a beautiful warm lavender color and I thought it was gorgeous and natural. It gets even more purple-rich after it freezes.
So, what do we need? Easy and simple ingredients using whole foods and unrefined sugars:
- cashews
- dairy-free yogurt
- plant-based milk
- lemon juice
- maple syrup
- blueberries
- black grapes
- vanilla extract
To make this Vegan Blueberry Ice cream, you just need a blender and about 10 minutes.
Add your cashews, yogurt, non-dairy milk, lemon juice, maple syrup, blueberries, black grapes, vanilla and optional coconut sugar and salt to a blender, like a Vitamix. You will need to soak your cashews overnight if you don’t have a high-powered blender. Blend everything until smooth and then pour it into a container and freeze it.
How easy is that? No churn so no worrying if you don’t have an ice cream maker!
I hope you all really love this Vegan Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream! To say my hubby and daughter loved this would be the understatement of the year!
*This post contains affiliate links. See my full disclosure policy here.
If you make this recipe, be sure to leave feedback below and share your pic on Instagram or Facebook and tag me @thevegan8 #thevegan8!
Vegan Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 1 cup (150g) raw, unsalted cashews
- 3/4 cup (180g) "lite" canned coconut milk or cashew milk
- 1/2 cup (120g) vanilla dairy-free yogurt (any type should work)
- 2 tablespoons (30g) lemon juice (use 3 for a more tart flavor)
- 1 cup (150g) blueberries
- 1/2 heaped cup (90g) black grapes (this is what additionally helps the purple color and natural sweetness)
- 1/4 cup (80g) pure maple syrup or agave
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
- optional: 2 tablespoons (20g) coconut sugar for a sweeter ice cream (I felt the ice cream was plenty sweet with all of the fruit, so taste the mixture before adding the sugar)
Instructions
- If you do not have a high-powered blender, then you will need to soak your cashews for 8 hours or overnight (preferred) in a bowl of warm water to soften them first. Otherwise, your ice cream will be gritty. Drain and rinse the cashews and proceed. No need to soak them if you have a high-powered blender.
- Add all of the ingredients (except the sugar) to your blender and process until 100% smooth. Taste and if you feel you want it sweeter, add the sugar. The grapes are very sweet, so I didn't feel it was absolutely necessary but of course my daughter liked it better with the sugar.
- Now, if you have an ice cream maker, then by all means, use it. Your ice cream texture will be even better AND more creamy, but if you don't have one, it will still work. Pour into a tight-fitting container and place a piece of plastic wrap directly on top of the ice cream and a tight lid. Place in the freezer for about an hour and stir the ice cream around really well, as the edges will start to firm up first. Add back to the freezer and do this every 30 minutes to an hour until it is solid or at your desired consistency. A few hours should do it, depending on your freezer temp. After that, if you let it freeze overnight, you may need to let it sit out at room temperature for about 15 minutes or so to soften a bit before eating. Again, this will depend on how cold you keep your freezer.
Notes
Omgggg this turned out amazing. I substituted red grapes and raw honey. I also used slightly less lemon- it’s always my experience that some lemons are “stronger” than others so I usually start with half and add more to taste. I added a touch more vanilla extract because the coconut yogurt I used was unsweetened/unflavored. At the end I wanted more blueberry flavor so I added a handful more blueberries, and didn’t want that to make the recipe too icy so I added a good splash of coconut milk to compensate. I finished it off by mixing in some oat based “pie” chunks that really took it over the top. Thanks for another epic recipe Brandi!!
Made this in the ninja creami-it is amazing-incredible flavor.
Do you have a suggestion on what to do if you can’t find black grapes? Thanks! Would really love to make this.
This was definitely awesome! It tasted phenomenal and was so easy to make! I could of drank it right from the blender 😜
This was a hit and beautiful. I bought bulk cashew butter, so much easier, worth the little extra. I also added some strawberries but still got the good color. My cashew yogurt was plain. Adding the coconut sugar wasn’t necessary and turned that beautiful color a bit off. I used the hand mixer to the slightly thawed frozen leftovers and it was perfect. Thanks for the great recipe. Just saw the mint chocolate frozen fudge, will try it next.
This recipe is TO DIE FOR!!! I know, I know, one’s country and one’s family are to die for, food is to eat! But this is SO delicious! I have made it several times and loved it each time, and today I tried a little twist. Blueberries are delicious, but I also love strawberries. So today I made this ice cream with strawberries and red grapes instead of blueberries and black grapes. I kept the proportions and measurements exactly the same, just made those two swaps. So so so yummy! Tastes exactly like strawberry cheesecake, which used to be favorite ice cream before going vegan. Brandi you are phenomenal!
Yeowza! This is so delicious! I used about 1 cup of black grapes and another 1/2 cup of pineapples and strawberries that I had left over from a Jason’s Deli fruit cup side in lieu of sugar. It really does taste like a berry cheesecake! I love this!!!
Woohoo! So glad you loved it!
Soooooo Gooood!!! Thank You!
Yay!
I can’t believe that this ice cream is dairy free! Tastes exactly like cheese cake! And the color is gorgeous! You are a genius Brandi! Your recipes never disappoint! Thank you!!!
Wow. It is so so delicious. I Divided the recipe so I could share with my daughters and their family. They don’t do a whole food plant-based so I only gave them a little to taste. Well after I made it it was so good one family didn’t get any at all I eat it the other family liked it so much she wanted the recipe and now they’re making it it really is good and easy I loved it thank you so much and I don’t have a high-speed blender I just had a regular blender
So very wonderful to hear this Jeanie, thank you!