Homemade Cold Stone Sweet Cream

Published March 26, 2012. Updated February 14, 2024

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Homemade Cold Stone Sweet Cream Ice Cream is the healthier and cheaper way to enjoy your favorite dessert—anytime you want it! It’s so fun to make at home with your kids, and it’s WAY better than your average scoop of vanilla ice cream. Trust me! 

Ice cream is something I will never give up!  It’s just one of those things that makes life good.  It makes life simple for a moment to just be able to sit back on the comfy sofa or in the warm sunshine and enjoy a generous scoop of silky smooth, perfectly sweet ice cream.  I can’t explain my addiction but at least I will admit it =).

Homemade Cold Stone Sweet Cream Ice Cream
My all-time favorite is Cold Stone Creamery’s Sweet Cream Ice Cream.  So, of course, I’ve had to figure out how to make it on my own at home.  I’d have to say the recipe I created tastes exactly the same.  I did make a change in ingredients compared to what they use, they use guar gum as a thickener but I didn’t want to purchase it so I used cornstarch in my recipe.

The benefits of guar gum are that you don’t have to heat the ice cream for it to thicken, whereas with cornstarch you do.  But the benefit of cornstarch is that it is a much more common household ingredient so you likely already have it on hand and use it for other recipes.

To explain Cold Stone Creamery’s Sweet Cream Ice Cream I would call it The Ice Cream of the Gods.  Purely decadent, silky smooth, simple yet unbelievably incredible, and the perfect base for any “mix-in.”  My personal favorite “mix-ins” for my Homemade Cold Stone Sweet Cream Ice Cream are Oreos or brownies.

I also love raspberries and graham cracker crust.  Oh and Twix, okay okay I love them all but my top fav is Oreos.  What’s your favorite mix-in?  Pick your favorite and add it to this insanely delicious Sweet Cream Ice Cream recipe.  I also love to eat it excluding mix-ins, it’s so amazingly good no mix-ins are needed, just a bonus if desired.

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4.91 from 10 votes

Cold Stone Creamery Sweet Cream Ice Cream – make it at home!

Copycat Cold Stone Creamy Sweet Cream Ice Cream! One of my favorite ice cream recipes!
Servings: 6
Prep10 minutes
Cook10 minutes
Chill4 hours
Ready in: 20 minutes

Ingredients

Recommended mix ins:

  • crushed oreos
  • cookie dough bites , chopped
  • crushed graham cracker or graham pie crust
  • berries
  • diced brownies
  • sprinkles
  • chopped chopped candy bars
  • caramel , chocolate or berry sauce
  • crushed sugar cones or waffle cones
  • chocolate chips
  • chopped nuts
  • ...basically whatever you feel like =)

Instructions

  • In a large saucepan, whisk together sugar and cornstarch until combine. Pour in cream, milk and corn syrup and whisk until well blended. Cook mixture over medium heat (sometimes I even cook it over medium high to speed it up a bit), stirring constantly until mixture comes just to a gentle boil. 
  • Once mixture reaches a gentle boil, reduce heat and allow mixture to gently bubble, stirring constantly, for 30 seconds. Strain mixture through a fine mesh sieve into a large bowl. Cover mixture with saran wrap or wax paper, pressing directly against the surface of the ice cream base to prevent a skin from forming. 
  • Refrigerate mixture until fully chilled, then transfer to freezer and freeze 1 hour - 1 1/2 hours (I've found this really helps the ice cream structure when freezing post ice cream maker processing, it basically gives it a head start). Transfer extra chilled ice cream mixture to an ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturers directions. 
  • Transfer ice cream to an airtight container and freeze until nearly firm, or freeze until firm and soften in microwave about 5-10 seconds until slightly softened. Mix in desired "mix-ins" (if you wanted to prepare just as Cold Stone does, you could freeze a marble slab then use two large spoons to fold in mix-ins using chilled marble slab, or alternately you could add the mix-ins in during the last 5 minutes of processing in ice cream maker).

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84 Comments

  • JS

    To the author, i do not understand the purpose of cooking then freezing for another 1-1.5 hours when you’re going to pour the mixture into an ice cream maker and then have to refresh on top of that. Would you say this depends on what type of ice cream maker you’re using? I have a commercial ICM with a compressor. It takes 40-50 mins for “soft serve” ice cream and then most recipes recommend another 2 hour min freeze for “ice cream” thickness. I don’t see the point in freezing before churning, only to have to refresh. Plus I think this could affect the consistency of the final product.

    • Jaclyn

      Jaclyn Bell

      Yes this step could vary based on the ice cream maker. Most home models aren’t super efficient, but a commercial grade shouldn’t need this step.

  • Megan

    Truly bad. Doesn’t taste like sweet cream and it leaves a gross coating in your mouth.

    • Jaclyn

      Jaclyn Bell

      Sorry to hear that, your cream must be bad if it doesn’t taste like sweet cream. As far as texture goes maybe try letting it soften up a bit.

  • Tara

    Oh my gosh, I am seriously hugging you for making this imitation recipe! This stuff is HEAVEN!! I love Cold Stone and I’m thrilled to be able to make this at home! And I’m laughing at the other comment. Make it and you will see- SO much better than regular vanilla ice cream!

  • Janice Lynne Cagan-Teuber

    What is wrong with just cream and sugar, or sweetener? To me, THAT is sweet cream ice cream. No need for anything else. The purists of us just want the cream and something to sweeten it.

    • Heather

      Nothing’s wrong with it. You can make your purist recipe, and other people can make what they want.

  • irene

    Would you please explain step 3 – not sure what you’re saying.

    • Jaclyn

      Jaclyn Bell

      Let it get cold in the fridge first then transfer to the freezer for a little while to get extra cold. Unless you have a commercial style ice cream maker.

  • sierra h

    PLEASE please please make the cake batter ice cream from cold stone as well!!!!! most websites just add in cake mix but not sure if its safe to eat it that way. please make it!!

    • Jasmine Jackson

      I worked at Cold Stone for 3 years and made the ice cream. The cake batter ice cream recipe is literally just sweet cream with dry cake mix added to it. We would mix some of the sweet cream with the cake mix in a big bowl and then pour it straight into the ice cream machine. There’s no eggs or anything. I don’t know if it was yellow cake or what but it was yellowish in color.

      • Sasha Johnston

        Hi Jasmine,
        Do you remember how the White Chocolate flavor was made? I can’t find it at any Cold Stone anymore. I
        I’ve tried making it using this recipe and adding White Chocolate coffee syrup.
        Thank you

      • KC

        Second this. Worked there too and agree, we just added dry cake mix to the sweet cream base.

      • Jasmine

        Hey Jasmine – could you please share how to make the Cold Stone Chocolate ice cream? Did you use cocoa powder? Do you recall the ratio of cocoa to sugar?

  • Alexis

    It *is* a bit sweet but it’s wonderful otherwise. It turned out so well, I’m wondering if you know a similarly easy recipe for chocolate ice cream.