Chocolate Almond Nice Cream Recipe

Chocolate almond nice cream is made with just 4 ingredients, and uses only banana as the sweetener! This healthy ice cream is dairy-free, refined sugar-free, super chocolaty, rich from the almond butter and super easy to make. It will quickly become your go-to healthy soft-serve ice cream once you try it!

Chocolate almond nice cream recipe

Healthy ice cream makes me happy. Tradition ice cream always leaves my stomach feeling not so great, and the high sugar amounts aren’t great for everyday treats.

However, when your healthy homemade ice cream is sweetened with just bananas, is flavored with chocolate and almond butter, and doesn’t take hours of churning in an ice cream machine, it’s an easy YES to chocolate almond nice cream!

My kids are obsessed like I am, and anytime we have ripe bananas to freeze, they ask for banana soft serve like this recipe I’m sharing!

This sweet treat is an easy yes with no added sugar, and it’s a fun way to change up how we enjoy slightly overripe bananas.

What is nice cream?

Have you heard of nice cream before? If not, here’s the scoop on it.

Nice cream is banana soft serve ice cream. It’s made with frozen banana slices or banana chunks that are blended into a creamy ice cream. 

Why is it called nice cream? Because texture-wise it’s like ice cream, but it’s made with better-for-you ingredients!

Nicer for your health.

Still just as tasty!

Simple ingredients for chocolate almond nice cream

Scroll down to view the recipe card below for the full ingredients list, nutrition facts, and step-by-step instructions.

• bananas
• almond milk (here’s how to make your own)
• almond butter
• unsweetened cocoa powder

How to make nice cream

1. Start by freezing your bananas (if you aren’t already starting with frozen bananas).  Take 2 ripe bananas, peel, and slice them into 1-2 inch pieces.  Lay the sliced bananas on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet.  Place in the freezer and allow the banana to fully freeze. The bananas will take a couple of hours (2-3) to freeze.
2. When the banana pieces are frozen, it’s time to make chocolate almond nice cream!  Place the frozen banana pieces in a food processor (or high-speed blender) and pulse a few times to begin to break them down.  After that, turn the food processor on and allow it to run for 30 seconds, breaking the banana down.  It will look kind of stuck right about then.
3. Add in 1 tbsp of milk (up to 2), almond butter, and cocoa powder.  Turn the food processor back on, and let it run for 30 seconds.  Scrape down the side and break up any chunks that get stuck – we want smooth nice cream with soft-serve consistency!  Continue to process until you are left with smooth, creamy nice cream.  You can use it right away, or place it in a loaf pan lined with parchment paper and freeze to make it a little more solid and scoopable.
4. Enjoy many scoops of nice cream with almond slivers and/or chocolate chips!

Best toppings for healthy chocolate ice cream

Here are so fun and tasty toppings to make ice cream eating even more exciting!

• Dark chocolate chips
• Cacao nibs
• Sliced almonds
• Chocolate syrup
• Chopped peanuts
• Fresh berries like raspberries, blueberries and strawberries
• Granola

How to store frozen dessert

You can definitely make this in advance and store it in the freezer.  A great idea for when your sweet tooth hits!

Once the chocolate nice cream is made, add it to a freezer-safe container, and keep frozen up to 6 months.

When it’s time to enjoy your treat, place the container on the counter at room temperature for at least 10 minutes to make it more scoopable.

Substitutions

Below you’ll find a list of substitutions that will work well in this chocolate banana ice cream recipe. 

If you try something different out, please leave a comment below letting us all know how it turned out!

Almond milk – Feel free to use any dairy-free milk in place of almond milk – cashew milk, coconut milk, and oat milk are all great options.  If you don’t need to keep this as a dairy-free ice cream, you can also use regular cow’s milk here.

Almond butter – Peanut butter, cashew butter, sunflower seed butter, and coconut butter are all great substitutes for almond butter.

Cocoa powder – Cacao powder will work in place of cocoa powder.  You could also use carob powder for a chocolate-like flavor.

More healthy ice cream recipes you’ll love

• Healthy peanut butter banana soft serve
• Açai ice cream
• Sweet potato ice cream
• Melon mint sorbet recipe without ice cream maker
• Frozen peanut butter cup pie
• Orange mango kefir popsicles
• Prune and almond butter popsicles
• Protein cottage cheese ice cream

If you try this chocolate nice cream recipe, I’d love it if you left a star rating and comment below letting me know how it turned out!

XO

Heather

Originally published March 2021. Updated April 2023.