In honor of National Ice Cream Day (yes, it’s a thing!), I made one of my favorite flavoring of ice cream. Plus, it’s one of the lowest carb ice creams that I have made before. It’s almost pure fat – and it tastes fantastic to boot.
The flavors of the brown butter and heavy cream come together to form an almost caramel type flavor. If you’re familiar with the keto caramel recipe, then you’ll see that this one has some similarities. You brown the butter, add cream, and mix everything together to make a nice syrup-like texture. Adding the pecans gives a slightly salty element, which really brings out the flavor. Though, if you’re a thrill seeker, feel free to add a little bit more salt to your own taste.
Yields 3 servings of Brown Butter Pecan Keto Ice Cream
The Preparation
- 5 tablespoons butter
- 1/4 cup pecans, crushed
- 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
- 25 drops liquid stevia
- 1 1/2 cups unsweetened carton coconut milk
- 1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum
The Execution
1. In a pan over low heat, stir butter until melted and begins to turn a deep amber color.
2. Add pecans to a plastic bag and crush pecans.
3. Once butter is browned, add heavy cream, stevia, and pecans. Stir together well.
4. Add coconut milk, butter mixture, and xanthan gum to a container. Then use a whisk to mix everything together.
5. Add mixture to your ice cream machine and run according to manufacturers instructions.
6. Serve and enjoy!
This makes a total of 3 servings of Browned Butter Pecan Keto Ice Cream. Each serving comes out to be 321 calories, 34.6g fats, 0.9g net carbs, and 1.6g protein.
| NUTRITION | CALORIES | FAT | CARBS | FIBER | NET CARBS | PROTEIN |
| 5 tablespoon butter | 509 | 57.5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.6 |
| 1/4 cup pecans | 180 | 18.7 | 3.6 | 2.5 | 1.1 | 2.4 |
| 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream | 202 | 21.5 | 1.6 | 0 | 1.6 | 1.7 |
| 25 drop liquid stevia | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1 1/2 cup unsweetened carton coconut milk | 68 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum | 4 | 0 | 0.9 | 0.9 | 0 | 0 |
| Totals | 962 | 103.7 | 6.2 | 3.4 | 2.8 | 4.7 |
| Per Serving (/3) | 321 | 34.6 | 2.1 | 1.1 | 0.9 | 1.6 |
Browned Butter Pecan Keto Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 5 tablespoon butter
- ¼ cup pecans crushed
- ¼ cup heavy whipping cream
- 25 drop liquid stevia
- 1 ½ cup unsweetened carton coconut milk
- ¼ teaspoon xanthan gum
Instructions
- Add the butter to a pan over low heat, stirring until melted and beginning to take on a deep amber color.
- Put the pecans in a plastic bag and crush (you can use a rolling pin for this).
- Once the butter is browned, add in the heavy cream, stevia, and pecans. Stir together well.
- Add the coconut milk, butter mixture, and xanthan gum to a container. Whisk everything together well.
- Add the mixture to your ice cream machine and follow the manufacturer's instructions.
- Serve and enjoy!
This was the best! So good, I had to make it again a few days later! A few weeks ago I altered the recipe–took out the pecans and added cinnamon to make the perfect Horchata Ice Cream. I was having a hard time hitting my macros until I found this. Thanks again!
Cant wait to try this.
Can coconut milk be subbed for almond milk in this? It looks delicious!
Yum! Do you think swerve could be used in place of liquid stevia?
Yes, you could use Swerve as a replacement. I may suggest grinding the swerve first into a powder prior to adding it.
Definitely a mistake on my part. I thought originally it would make 4 (I usually pre-write articles as I’m making the food). I did the macros and serving sizes and thought 3 was good. You would still get plenty of ice cream with 4 servings though, if that fits into your macros better.
Did you fully chill the mix before adding it to the ice cream machine?
Can I use heavy whipping cream instead of the coconut. I’m not a fan of coconut flavor
Yes, you can!
It depends on what your ice cream makers instructions are. My newest one has a built in compressor, so no need to chill the mix. My old one was a simple churning style one, so you did have to chill the mix (and freeze the bucket).
Any suggestions for a dairy free substitute on this and other ice cream recipes? I was thinking of coconut cream, but not sure on the thickness, or if additional guard or xanthium gum would be needed. (Trader Joe’s sells coconut cream in cans for a decent price)
Hi Brooke! I think that coconut cream would work great. The recipes I’ve seen for coconut cream ice cream usually call for some kind of thickener (like corn starch) so xantham gum probably would be needed. I don’t know if you can use the recipe as is and just sub the cream or not because I haven’t tried it yet. If you do this please let me know how it turns out because I see a lot of questions about dairy substitutes lately!
Is using an immersion blender or regular blender fine instead of an ice cream machine?
No. The ice cream machine freezes the mixture as it churns it. The blender or immersion blender will just mix the ingredients around.
Hi! Do you think it’s possible to use a vitamix to make these lovely ice cream recipes? I really would like to make the appliance work without having to invest in a ice cream maker as well. It seems feasible, but I’m not sure how to change up the order of operations to make it work.
Hi Matt, I’ve heard of it being done but I don’t own a Vitamix so I’m not exactly sure how they are. If I search for Vitamix ice cream recipes they all seem to include something frozen. I think you could try freezing the coconut milk in an ice cube tray and then blending it.
Thanks, Laura! I’ll get to experimenting with that! Thank you guys for all the hard work on this site. I haven’t taken any pictures to log my progess, but I’m down 100 lbs in a year. This site was my launch point. Thank you so much!
Hi! Do you think I could replace the cream with almond milk? The last couple times I’ve made ice cream with cream the end result coated my tongue a bit too much and I don’t know if it’s me or the recipe
I have the same complaint
Almond milk might not work because of the difference in fat content.
So my Ice Cream maker says to chill/cool all mixtures before churning.
At what step in this process is that best? Is it after everything has been combined?
That might be because you churned too long and part of the cream started to turn into butter.
You both can certainly use almond milk or coconut milk from the carton for your ice cream recipes. We have quite a few ice cream recipes on the site. You do need some fat in the mix, though, otherwise it will just turn into a ice-y. I’ve done chocolate ice creams with just almond milk (and some guar gum to help thicken) and the consistency is very close to a Frosty.
Is it possible to use granulated Swerve instead of the liquid Stevia?
I haven’t tried that but I think it should work okay. 🙂
Can I use coconut milk from the can instead of from the carton?
I did not have success with this recipe. It didn’t taste very good and the texture was off.
I’m really sorry to hear – it’s a favorite in our house. Could you go into a bit more detail on what type of ice cream maker you were using? It’s possible that the butter wasn’t emulsified enough and froze into “chunks” into the ice cream.
You should be able to, just remember that it will be higher in carbs.
Ive been having problems making this and other keto (or maybe just homemade) ice cream recipes. Despite using my ice cream maker as instructed (cuisinart frozen bowl electric) my ice cream comes out stiff, frozen solid, hard pack. Am I missing a step? Or is this a result of using alternative sugars?
Usually if you put your ice cream into the freezer it will harden up. You can add vodka or use a sweetener like xylitol (note, it has some glycemic impact) to keep it soft in the freezer. When using an ice cream machine, just run it for a bit less time and it should come out a fantastic consistency. When it goes hard when you freeze it, you can let it defrost for 15-20 minutes before eating it again.
This came out more like an ice milk rather than ice cream. Flavor was OK but consistency was almost watery.
I definitely had a creamy texture when I made this – did you use an ice cream maker when you made it, or did you freeze it and stir overnight? Did you by any chance leave the xanthan gum out of the recipe?
Used Xanthan gum, (2) tbs. of vodka, and ice cram maker…I did double the recipe, but I wouldn’t think that would affect the texture…curious as to why no eggs were used in the recipe…Bill
Truth be told Bill, I’m not sure why it came out so watery for you. It shouldn’t have mattered if you doubled the recipe as long as it froze well in the ice cream maker. You’re welcome to add some egg yolks next time to help add more creamy/thickness to it, but I truly thought that the ice cream was pretty creamy for the calorie/fat content in it.
Thanks Craig…I’ll probably try 4 egg yolks next time…
Please do let me know how it goes!
I will…
This was so good. Thank you for the recipe. Had to borrow an ice cream machine and now I want one as a staple after this recipe!
Hahah, homemade ice cream on keto is a real treat. If needed, you can find cheap ice cream makers online where you freeze the bucket. The ones with condensers inside can get fairly expensive.
I made this last night and Oh my gosh! it was amazing! I used canned coconut milk and since I don’t like the flavor of Stevia, I replaced it with Swerve. I would not have known it wasn’t real ice cream. Thank you
That’s great to hear – very happy you enjoyed it! 😀