3 Ingredient Chocolate Ice Cream

It's National Ice Cream Day today!

To celebrate I'm sharing a super simple, yet super scrumptious ice cream recipe that Ava made a while back. It only takes three ingredients and you don't even need an ice cream maker. It really doesn't get any easier!

Most of these photos Ava actually took herself with my camera set up on a tripod as she planned to make a video to share on her YouTube channel. She hasn't gotten around to making the video yet so I'm hijacking them for my blog for now. I'll make sure to share her video when she gets around to finishing it.

As I mentioned, this recipe if super simple and only needs three ingredients - which you may have in your kitchen right now. This recipe is for chocolate ice cream, but you could always switch out the chocolate for any other flavor you might like to add. I'm not normally a fan of chocolate ice cream, but this is so good. It's seriously one of the best chocolate ice creams I've ever eaten!

Museum of Ice Cream... Again!

A few weekends back we visited the Museum of Ice Cream here in San Francisco. It was the second visit for Mathilde and I (you can see you first visit before it was open to the public here) but the first time going for Ava, Lola and Kim.

It was much busier this time around, as I had expected, but we were still able to take our time and see everything at our own pace - it just meant waiting a little longer for photos every now and then. With plenty of fun stuff to see and delicious treats to eat, the girls didn't mind one bit! Although there were plenty of tears from Mathilde when she didn't get to spend as long in the sprinkle pool as last time! 

Because I've already shared our original visit here on Little Hiccups, and a more detail "what to see and do" post on Mommy Nearest (which you can see here) I won't go into too much detail this time around and will just let the pictures speak for themselves. There are a lot of pictures so grab yourself a coffee, or an ice cream, and enjoy!

Museum of Ice Cream

If you're following Little Hiccups on Instagram you would've seen that Mathilde and I attended a press preview of the Museum of Ice Cream here in San Francisco a few weeks ago. You can see our visit over on Mommy Nearest but today I thought I'd share some more photos of all the ice cream fun with you. And by more photos, I mean a LOT!

If you haven't heard of Museum of Ice Cream it's a pop up exhibition dedicated to all things ice cream. It's not a museum in the traditional sense, but rather a colorful experience perfect for taking a ton of selfies! Most of the exhibits are hands on and each room features different music with dancing highly recommended. Oh, and there's plenty of ice cream to try too. It couldn't be a museum dedicated to ice cream without tasty frozen treats, right?

Here's a look at some (or rather, a lot) of my favorite moments from our visit to Museum of Ice Cream. Be prepared for a lot of pink! Oh, and made sure you scroll all the way through to see Mathilde being interviewed on TV!

52 Weeks: Week 15

Week 15: Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day

Yesterday was Ben & Jerry's annual Free Cone Day. The girls and I headed to our local store for an icy after dinner treat. We arrived an hour before the promotion ended and as you can imagine there was a pretty long line. The line became even longer as we approached 8pm and the end of the promotion. I guess everyone loves free ice cream!

A Birthday Party at Fenton's

This Sunday just past Ava celebrated her birthday with a small group of friends at Fenton's Creamery in Oakland. We hadn't been to Fenton's before but it's such a nice place that it kind of suited saving it for a special occasion. And what could be more special than a birthday party? 

As part of Ava's birthday party we went on the behind the scenes Arctic Tour. The kids, all wearing their "soda jerk" hats learned all about the history of Fenton's, watched how the whipped cream for sundaes is made, watched how the ice cream is made, felt the freezing cold conditions in the ice cream freezer, and, most importantly, tasted freshly made cookies and cream ice cream.

Here's a look at the tour...

Another Ice Cream Party

This week Ava turned eight years old. I still can't believe how fast my kids are growing up - and I don't even want to think about how fast this means I'm getting old!

To celebrate Ava's birthday we'll be having a party with some of her school friends at Fenton's Creamery in Oakland this Sunday. Fenton's is an absolute East Bay institution but we're yet to make it there. Sometimes not owning a car has its downsides!

As Ava's party will be at an ice cream parlor it seemed only fitting to go with an ice cream theme for the invitations. Lola celebrated her fourth birthday with an ice cream party only three and a half months ago so it did feel a little odd rehashing the same theme but I made sure to keep things very different. Lola's party invitations featured popsicles (you can see them here) so for Ava's I drew ice cream in a cone topped with chocolate sauce and a cherry. It goes perfectly with the make your own sundae bar the kids will be treated to at the party.

Pumpkin Bowl Ice Cream

Summer may be over but that doesn't mean that we can't have ice cream, right? Every day is a good day for ice cream, but holidays are even better. 

I've partnered with 'Got Milk?' to bring you this simple Halloween themed dessert. It's so simple your kids will be able to make it themselves. It's so much fun they'll want to make it themselves. And what could be better than happy kids getting involved in making their own food?

My kids and I are big fans of making our own ice cream - without an ice cream maker! All you need are a few simple ingredients, some ice, salt and ziplock bags and you can make delicious ice cream in just five minutes. 

My kids love to make ice cream using this technique. Food always tastes better when you make it yourself, especially if it's fun to make. And I like knowing exactly what is going into my kids' food. This recipe combines the goodness of milk and a little physical activity to make a fun, delicious treat. It's a fun way to get a little more milk into your children's diet and to provide their bodies with the fuel they need to grow.

To give our ice cream a Halloween theme we're coloring it orange and serving it up in carved out mini pumpkins. My kids aren't huge fans of pumpkin flavor so we're making the ice cream vanilla however you could add pumpkin pie spice for a more authentic taste of the season.   

Ice Cream Party Invites

I can not believe that my little Lola is going to be four tomorrow!

We'll be celebrating her birthday this coming weekend with an ice cream party. Lola chose the theme for this year's party quite some time ago. In fact, I believe it may have been right after her last birthday party finished!

Lola has been super excited about having an ice cream party, and I've got to say that it's a pretty fun theme to get creative with. I've got all sorts of ice cream and popsicle themed activities and accessories lined up for the party and I can't wait to share them all with you.

So let's start by having a look at the invitations...

An ice cream party needs tasty invitations, right? These little chocolate covered popsicle invitations do the trick. I made them three dimensional complete with popsicle sticks, a bite taken out the top and a wrapper. Don't they look delicious?