Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia Ice Cream is packed with grated chocolate and fresh cherries! Perfect for all the chocolate and cherry lovers, especially during the dog days of summer!
We do love Ben & Jerry’s ice cream at our house. And furthermore, we’ve taken the Ben & Jerry’s Factory Tour in Waterbury, Vermont. (More than once I confess.) It’s quite the fun destination.
The best part comes at the end, after the movie and walk-through factory tour. Because at the end you get free ice cream samples of whatever ice cream flavor they’re currently manufacturing! So woo hoo!
So one day we’re up at Ben & Jerry’s doing the tour and eating the awesome ice-cream. (I believe the flavor that day was Boston Cream Pie — yeah and uh huh!)
And I come upon the Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book in the gift shop. Well I’m no fool, and it isn’t long before they’re ringing me up at the register. (Ben & Jerry, they’re no fools either – Cha-ching$ Cha-ching$.)
All Ben & Jerry’s best ice cream secrets are now tucked in a little brown bag under my arm as I gleefully wend my way home to New Hampshire! We sure have enjoyed this book through the years, and gotten more than our money’s worth!
In fact, our family tradition is to tote this book and our ice-cream maker along on summer vacation so we can try out new flavors.
My Charlie (10) spends hours poring over this book. He has a lotta of ideas, dreams about what flavors we should make next. (Also recipe improvements for Ben & Jerry. HA!)
I’m chomping at the bit to tell you about the delicious flavors we’ve tried. The wonderful kinds we still want to make. The funky names of the current Ben & Jerry fabulous ice cream flavors. I could chat on this topic ad infitum. (Can you tell?) Trust me, we’ll just have to revisit this. A blog field trip to Ben & Jerry’s?
But Bing cherries are in season right now, and since I’m a fresh cherry and chocolate lover, I’m sharing this delicious recipe for Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia Ice Cream. I’ve always wanted to make this particular recipe and that’s the fun of what I do. Now I have an excuse!
I really must do this for the blog, honey.
Giggle. (Of course no one’s exactly complaining around here….)
So I wanted you to see this ice cream up close. See those yummy flecks of grated dark chocolate? Yeah, this recipe calls for a Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate candy bar.
And here’s what the Ben & Jerry’s recipe book says regarding how they named this ice cream flavor.
” A couple of Dead Heads in Maine sent us a postcard with a name for a new flavor. They left the recipe up to us. We got to work with some fresh bing cherries and threw in the chocolate flakes as a last minute inspiration. At last report, both Jerry Garcia and his wife Carolyn are crazy about it.”
So there you have it.
You can serve Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia Ice Cream soft with a spoon, straight from the ice cream maker.
Or freeze it hard for 6-8 hours and serve on a sugar or waffle cone like we do. So without further ado, the Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia Ice Cream recipe. Enjoy every delicious bite!
*UPDATE 5/24/16 – I’ve updated this recipe from the original Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream recipe book to include cooking the milk, cream and eggs into a custard before freezing. This is to reduce the possibility of salmonella. You can make it without cooking the custard first if you’re not concerned about consuming raw eggs. I’ve made it both ways.
Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia Ice Cream
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup shaved chocolate Hershey's Special Dark Chocolate Candy Bar
- 1/2 cup fresh Bing cherries halved and pitted
- You may use canned cherries, but drain the syrup first
- 4 large eggs
- 1 1/2 cups granulated white sugar
- 4 cups heavy or whipping cream
- 2 cups milk
Instructions
- Place shaved chocolate flakes and prepared cherries in separate bowls.
- Cover tightly and refrigerate.
- Place cream and milk in a medium saucepan and heat over medium-low heat on the stovetop.
- Meanwhile, separately, whisk eggs in medium mixing bowl 'til light and fluffy.
- Slowly whisk the sugar into the egg mixture, a little at a time until it's thoroughly combined, then 1-2 minutes more. Set aside.
- When the cream/milk mixture reaches 140°, remove from heat.
- Very slowly add in about 1/3 of the hot cream/milk mixture into the egg/sugar mixture, whisking quickly the whole time 'til blended.
- (This "tempers" the eggs so they don't scramble when added.)
- Once thoroughly blended, add in the remaining cream/milk mixture.
- Return custard to sauce pan and heat on medium low heat until the mixture reaches 175°. (This kills off any harmful bacteria.)
- Remove from heat.
- Chill throughly until mixture is a minimum of 40°. (You want it very cold so it freezes well in the ice cream maker.)
- Transfer mixture to an ice cream maker and freeze following the manufacturer's instructions.
- After the ice cream stiffens (about 2 minutes before it's done), add the grated chocolate and cherries.
- Continue freezing until the ice cream is ready.
- Serve soft, or freeze for 6-8 hours for hard ice cream.
- (We usually freeze ours hard because we like it on sugar or waffle cones.)
Notes
So what’s your favorite Ben & Jerry’s ice cream? I’m partial to Coffee Heath Crunch.
You may also enjoy: Peppermint Stick Ice Cream
Healing Tomato says
Cherry and butterscotch are 2 of my favorite Ben and Jerry’s flavors.
Marye says
I swear, Allie – you are the ice cream queen! I love cherry Garcia!
Eva says
What a nice ice cream ! Looks better than a real Ben & Jerry !
Robin @ Simply Southern Baking says
Oh my goodness Allie! This is my husband’s FAVORITE ice cream! Heading over to pin this now. I’ve got to check my cookbook collection…I might have bought this years ago.
Jeff the Chef says
How cool! I love making ice cream, and this looks like a great recipe. But my ice cream doesn’t usually turn out as creamy as B&J’s. Will this?
Linda Jenkins says
Hi Allie, while I haven’t tried this flavor of ice cream, for I am not a fan of chocolate, I have taken the tour of the factory in Vermont. Actually, Jack, Jen, Joby, Lucas, Landon and I spent two days in Burlington, Vermont, last summer. Ben and Jerry’s ice cream factory was one of our favorite stops during our getaway. I, too, loved the gift shop as much as I did the ice cream sample.
Mary Judd says
Allie, you are amazing! all these great recipes you fix for your family. We also did the Ben & Jerry tour. I got a kick out of the cemetery with the cute sayings of their retired ice cream flavours.
Denise says
That looks so delicious! We took a tour years ago. What fun!
Cathleen @ A Taste Of Madness says
I think I have only ever had ben and jeries once… in my life! This looks so good, maybe I don’t even need to go out to the store for some. May as well make my own 🙂
Julie @ Julie's Eats & Treats says
Oh wow I’m in trouble now that I know there is a recipe book for Ben & Jerry’s! This treat will be the first recipe I try!
Jay says
You made this? You’re my hero!
Allie says
Hey thanks Jay, I did. And it wasn’t that hard, the ice cream maker does all the work. Guess I better dust off my super hero cape just the same! 🙂
Chris Frazier says
I have the recipe book and a Cuisinart ice cream maker and I have made plenty of there recipes and believe me they are good. My favorite Ben & Jerry’s is Cherry Garcia! I’ve been eating it for years. But I did notice in there recipe book it does not show the recipe for cherry ice cream. I know from eating Cherry Garcia for years, the ice cream in it is cherry flavored! I’m just wondering why the recipe does not consist of cherry flavored ice cream?
Allie says
Hey Chris, good point. You are so right, and I never even thought of that. I know there are kitchen specialty stores that sell boiled down cherry syrup, I wonder if that would be a possibility for making the ice cream itself cherry flavored? I might look at the label for their Cherry Garcia ice cream, see if I get any hints. Thanks so much for dropping by.
Lori H. says
I’ve seen additions of simmering the pits of the cherries with the milk/cream mixture and the straining them out deepens the cherry flavor in the milk/cream.
Allie says
Hey Chris, I did a search on recipes for homemade cherry syrup, and found a super easy one http://www.choosecherries.com/recipe/tart-cherry-syrup/ – you just simmer down bottled cherry juice and sugar until it is a syrup. It makes 1 cup and keeps for 6 months refrigerated. Next time I make Cherry Garcia I’m going to try adding some of this to the base.
Catherine says
Dear Allie, your homemade ice cream sounds wonderful. I love those beautiful cherries and bits of chocolate. Absolutely irresistible! xo, Catherine
Amy Basso | Amy's Apron says
I bought this book at a garage sale and made this ice cream! I can vouch it is AMAZING! Looks so yummy 🙂
Manila Spoon says
I love cherries and chocolate together and I am a fan of this particular ice cream! Thanks for the recipe – we owe you big time!
Julianne @ Beyond Frosting says
Oh this makes me miss home!! I used to work right down the street from their factory! And umm, Boston Cream Pie, I have to find it!!
Yankee Kitchen Ninja (Julianne) says
The factory is 10 minutes from my old digs — it was our favorite place to take visitors! My sister has that cookbook. I may need to steal I mean BORROW it from her now.
Chandra@The Plaid & Paisley Kitchen says
Ooh! Cherry Garcia is my favorite!
Aimee @ ShugarySweets says
This was the first flavor I ever tried from B&J. I love it and it still remains one of my favorites 🙂
Julie says
I heart Cherry Garcia Ice Cream!! (and you.)
Allie says
I heart you back!
Cynthia/What A Girl Eats says
cherry and chocolate is my favorite combo flavor combo! This is bound to be delicious!
Michelle @ A Dish of Daily Life says
This and Chunky Monkey are my favorite Ben & Jerry’s flavors! Thrilled to see a copycat recipe that I can make myself! This looks awesome!
Allie says
Ooooo…and ahhhhh…I love Chunky Monkey Michelle! 🙂
Arman @ thebigmansworld says
You actually recreated my all time favourite flavour- I need to make this!
Jocelyn @BruCrew Life says
That sounds like such a fun place to tour! And I totally would have walked out with that book too! Chocolate and cherry is such an awesome flavor combo, especially in ice cream! That first shot of ice cream has me craving some right now!
Tracy says
Oh boy! The recipe! This is Dave’s favorite ice cream! I will have to make this. I also want to buy that cookbook. I didn’t know they had this in the gift shop. Thank you Allie!
Allie says
Then Dave will love this, a post-birthday treat. I’m happy to share the book with you anytime Trac- save your pesos! 🙂
Krystle says
I love Ben & Jerry’s but the price these days makes me super sad! 🙁
Love this DIY version!
Kathy Jackson says
We made this for dessert at a cookout yesterday!!!! All I can say is OMG!!!! It was the best homemade ice cream that I have ever tasted. Make sure that you take the time to FREEZE the ice cream to get the texture and consistency of the original. Otherwise, you will have a soft serve that has a milk-shake texture. I discovered the trick about freezing the ice cream AFTER I served it to my guests. 🙁 but that is OK I WILL definitely be making this ice cream again!!!!
Allie says
Hey Kathy – so glad you and your guests loved the ice-cream. Cheers to Ben & Jerry. We do freeze ours and I promise you, it is even better frozen. And makes THE BEST waffle cones ever! Thanks so much for dropping by!
Ashley @ Big Flavors from a Tiny Kitchen says
I picked up this cookbook from that same tour yeeeears ago, but still haven’t made anything from it. D’oh! Cherry Garcia was my first favorite B&J flavor, so I’m glad to know the recipe is a good one! YUMMMMM…
Cynthia | What A Girl Eats says
I love the combination of cherries and chocolate! Trader Joe’s has a soy milk version, but I’ve always wanted to try and make my own!
Heather Kinnaird says
that is actually one flavor we have never tried, but it sounds SO good! and we are up to our ears in cherries right now
Laura Dembowski says
I have always wanted to make Cherry Garcia. This looks and sounds great. I use pasteurized eggs so no worries there either. A Ben and Jerry’s factory tour sounds amazing!!
EJ says
Hello!
This looks delicious ! If I don’t have a thermometer, are you able to approximate how long it takes to cook the milk/cream mixture in the saucepan to reach 140 degrees?
Allie says
Hey EJ – I would say somewhere around 10 – 15 minutes, stirring constantly. When the mixture/custard is just starting to coat the back of a spoon — it’s ready. Hope you enjoy!
Solidworks crack says
This is soooo good!!!
Tally erp 9 says
Sounds Amazing!!!
Jaime says
The serving size says 2. Can you tell me what that means? I just got an ice cream maker and knew I wanted this to be one of the first flavors I made! I can’t wait to make this.
Allie says
Congrats. on the new ice cream maker! Thanks for the heads up – I converted the recipes on my site from one program to another and it was not exactly seamless, apparently. The recipe makes 2 quarts. I love this recipe from Ben & Jerry’s, but I am still tweaking and experimenting with it. The next time I make this I am thinking about marinating the cherries in some sugar for a bit (then draining the juice) before adding them. Just to soften them up a bit. Or you could try canned cherries in juice (drained). I still haven’t tried it myself, but thought I would give you that heads up. Because sometimes when you freeze fresh fruit it can get pretty hard in ice cream, especially if the fruit is not ripe. So there’s a penny for my thoughts. Either way, I think you’ll love it. My family does anyway. Happy New Year Jaime and enjoy!
Michael Dennehy says
I really need to make ice cream! What do you recommend for ice cream makers?
Allie says
Hmmmm…you absolutely should make some homemade ice cream Mike. Because you don’t have enough to do right now. In fact, why not just open an ice cream shop? It’s so hot, and you’ve got lots of time on your hands ?, and no doubt you have some great little scoopers at your house. We have a Cuisinart ice cream maker – with an insert you freeze in the freezer – so no salt like the olden days!
Shashi at Savory Spin says
Lil Shashi is looking over my shoulder right now and she wants to take a trip to Vermont just to visit the Ben and Jerry’s Factory – and reading about that De-pinted Flavor Graveyard makes me wanna go too! 🙂
Thanks so much for sharing this recipe from their cookbook – it sounds wonderful! And – good luck tomorrow! Hoping everything is going thru as planned! xoxo
Kathy says
Wow! i love your story about how this is something your whole family enjoys together! Pouring over the book for hours/days/years sounds like something I would do, like Hudson! 🙂 I look forward to hearing more ice cream stories and more recipes. Thanks for sharing, Allie!!!
Louise Achor says
Oh my, that looks fabulous!yum!
brigitte says
J’adore les cerises,j’adore les glaces,ton dessert Allie est de la gourmandise à l’état pur, bisous belle journée!
Kelsie | the itsy-bitsy kitchen says
Yes PLEASE to the blog field trip :). Touring their factory sounds amazing. I didn’t know they make a Boston Cream Pie ice cream and my life will not be complete until I taste that deliciousness. This is one heckuva wonderful post, Allie! I have a feeling I’ll be eating ice cream all weekend.
Nisha @ Honey, What's Cooking says
This looks absolutely amazing. I love ben and jerry’s ice cream, my favorite is their chunky monkey. I’ve never made ice-cream at home tho.. so you didn’t use a churn ice-cream maker for this? I wasn’t sure based on the instructions.
puja says
Wow, the ice-cream looks so pretty Allie. I have just finished my dinner and your recipe is so tempting that, I am feeling like having ice-cream now. So I am planning to rush to the kitchen to make at least some instant ice-cream for me and my family. Thank for sharing such a wonderful recipe. 🙂
Anu - My Ginger Garlic Kitchen says
I love Ben & Jerry’s and this Cherry Garcia ice cream looks so wonderfully delish. I so want to visit Ben and Jerry’s Factory. How did I miss this wonderful post of yours? Thank god you posted it again so that I could see this. Wonderfully written beautiful ice cream story. Cherry season is here and I just can’t wait to try this.
Luci's Morsels says
This looks divine! Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia is one of my favorites!
Luci’s Morsels | fashion. food. frivolity.
Adina says
Mmm, I’d love some of this ice cream. My kids have been asking me the other day about making ice cream ourselves again, this recipe sounds great. Only one bummer: I was so happily anticipating the cherry season, we have a huge tree in our garden and tones of cherries every July. Well, this year seems to be one of those cherry-free years, I looked I think I’ve only spotted 3 or 4 green cherries… So today I have actually bought some cherries, the first ones I bought in years… When are you leaving for Romania?
Allie says
Hi Adina – Love that you have a cherry tree in your garden – too bad it’s an off year. Just got back from Romania yesterday- had a great trip. We spent some time in Buzau and Sighișoara and other places too. We were helping to teach english to children and adults. It was a wonderful trip and we got to meet so many amazing people. I was disappointed not to get to Sibiu, I know you had recommended that. We did get to Bran and stayed at an inn overlooking the valley and mountains. Your country is so beautiful! I hope all is well with you and your family! XO
Adina says
So glad to hear you liked it. I have never been to Buzau, but many many times to Sighisoara, it is not far from Sibiu, about 2 hours with the train. It is a beautiful town. And Castle Bran as well, I ‘ve been there a couple of times a long time ago. 🙂
bouncing balls says
I like to eat cherries. They are attractive and attractive. Generally they are great.
Gonzales says
Cutting cherries in quarters would be my only suggestion for improving this recipe. If you just cut them in half, they are a little too large and like hard balls when frozen. They are much more manageable in quarters. Otherwise I really loved this recipe!
Allie says
Great idea!!! Thanks for the tip Gonzales, and glad you enjoyed the ice cream.
Olga says
Allie, this looks tasty! These are absolutely mouth watering! It will quickly disappear in our house, very tasty and flavorful!
brawl stars oyna says
Your opinion is great, it is exactly what I think. If we go in that direction, everything will become much more perfect
sushi-cat2.com says
If I had read your article earlier, it would have been different. My ideas will definitely become more complete if you add your comments. It’s so wonderful
sushi cat 2 unblocked says
I think it is a good idea, I have thought of it but not as detailed as you.
Sue J says
Just a quick question. Are the eggs used whole or just the egg yokes?