Have I got a treat for you guys today.
This gelato. OMG. There are no wordsΒ (except I’ll probably write close to 650 or so. You know how I do.)
This crazy brainchild recipe of mine was inspired by our trip to Italy earlier this summer. We ate our body weights in gelato while there, sometimes twice a day. Unapologetically. Euphorically. It was glorious. Everyone else usually opted for indulgent flavors like dark chocolate, espresso, cookies and cream, or caramel. I almost always got lemon. I know. So boring. So old lady of me. I can’t help it! It was suuuuper hot and dark chocolate gelato just didn’t feel….refreshing enough for me. Lemon all the way.
The only other flavor I got during the entire trip was espresso. And good lordy, was it yummy. I was happy to trade in my lemon for once.
I have always been a big fan of coffee ice cream. Even as a kid, long before I was a coffee drinker, I loved the flavor of sweet and creamy coffee ice cream. It was (and still is) one of my mom’s favorite ice cream flavors, so it was always in the house. Maybe that’s why I love coffee so much now as an adult? I was started young? Shrug. Who knows. One thing I DO know is that it will forever be one of my favorite ice cream flavors, and the gelato in Italy was no different.
Gelato is soooo freaking good, guys. I don’t know why I don’t make it more often. In Italy, though, it’s even better. Way better than anything we can make here in the States. I suspect it has something to do with the eggs and milk they use. The gelato comes out sooooo incredibly creamy and light. It’s decadence at its best. I could eat it every day (and did!) for the rest of my life and not need any other dessert again. That sounds dramatic, but I mean it. I heart gelato.
Dan’s favorite ice cream flavors are cookies and cream and peanut butter chocolate. Pretty standard American stuff, huh? In recent years, though, he has been turned onto coffee ice cream (thanks to me). One of the gelato combinations he did quite frequently in Italy was one scoop of espresso and one scoop of cookies and cream. The combo was insane.
And that is how we ended up here! I told him, while walking around the streets of picturesque Tuscan towns, that I was going to create my own version of coffee cookies and cream gelato at home. He is used to me brainstorming recipe ideas (I do it pretty much constantly, especially while we are eating out), and probably just shrugged it off with a “OK, honey. That sounds delicious.” His token answer. Not an indifferent or annoyed answer, just the classic “OK, you’ve said that about everything we’ve eaten so far today” answer. Hah. I told ya: I DO IT ALL THE TIME.
So! He probably didn’t fully believe that I was going to create today’s gelato. He might have thought it was going to be filed away in the “make someday” pile. But nope! I made it happen. And he has never been so pleasantly surprised.
He sampled it for the first time last night and declared it one of the best things to EVER come out of my kitchen. He hates picking favorites (something I am constantly pressuring him to do), but he said “This one just might be the new favorite. Definitely one of the best things you have ever made.”
It’s that good, guys.
I mean, how could it not be? Coffee gelato (with two kinds of coffee!) swirled with tonnnnssss of chopped/crushed Oreo cookies (disclaimer: I put A LOT of cookies in this. No regrets).
Even a lemon freak like me can get behind this one.

Cookies & Cream Coffee Gelato
- Yield: 1 quart (6 servings) 1x
Ingredients
- 5 large egg yolks
- 1 cup sugar
- 1Β½ cups whole milk
- Β½ cup strong coffee (I like using cold brew coffee for this)
- 2 teaspoons instant espresso coffee
- 2 cups Oreo cookies, chopped or crushed
Instructions
- Whisk yolks and sugar in large bowl until well blended and creamy.
- Bring milk to boil in heavy medium saucepan. Gradually whisk hot milk into egg mixture.
- Whisk in the cold brew and instant espresso.
- Return the entire mixture to the same saucepan used for the milk and cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Be careful to not let the mixture come to a boil.
- Place a large mesh strainer over the same mixing bowl used to whisk together the egg yolks and sugar. Pour the hot custard through the strainer and discard any solids that may have formed.
- Refrigerate the custard until chilled, about 2 hours.
- When you are ready to churn your gelato, stir in the crushed Oreos and then transfer to your ice cream maker. Process the gelato according to the manufacturerβs instructions and then transfer to an airtight container. Freeze for an hour or two before serving.
5 stars for this one! Holy crap!
So being lactose intolerant I always have a hard time finding ice cream that is not “vanilla” or just plain garbage….I went out last year and picked up an ice cream maker from BB&B thinking I can just make whatever flavors I wanted using any old recipe. Nope…while Lactaid makes whole milk which is easy to find…it’s hard to find a cream that is lactose free. Any of the milk/cream alternatives tend to make ice cream rock solid out of the freezer. That’s always been a struggle. I don’t want to wait 15 minutes for it to thaw enough. π
so then we visited Italy. π
They have TONS of non dairy gelato in Rome. Anyone who has been there HAS to remember the shop that has 150 flavors. Thankfully…almost a third of them are dairy free made with coconut milk.
after we got home I decided to give the ice cream maker another shot…and I came across this recipe. made it once already and it’s absolutely perfect. soft right out of the freezer. I’m excited to use this exact base to make other flavors.
Just a note for anyone who needs a lactose free version. follow it exact using Lactaid whole milk and make sure you simmer it down at the end so that it thickens enough and you will always get the right texture right out of the freezer.
i think i’ll make a chocolate chip cookie dough next! π
thank you for this!