How to substitute skim milk for whole milk in ice cream?

I am trying to use up heavy cream (I have a lot!), and thought about trying our new ice cream maker for the first time. I only have skim milk however, and was hoping there was a way to compensate using skim instead of whole milk? Like, using a larger ratio of cream to milk?

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3 Comments

sfmiller
sfmiller December 2, 2015
You can definitely do this.

Whole milk in the U.S. is 3.25 percent butterfat (or .26 ounces per 8 ounces), and skim milk has no (or nearly no) fat. Whipping cream is 30 percent butterfat, so .87 ounces of whipping cream has as much fat as 8 ounces of whole milk.

In practical terms (rounding up): 1 ounce of whipping cream plus 7 ounces of skim milk contains about as much butterfat as 8 ounces of whole milk.
 
Liza's K.
Liza's K. December 1, 2015
I do it all the time without problems. Actually, I'll be doing it tonight when I make vanilla custard ice cream. I like a particularly eggy custardy base, which is why the lower fat content probably doesn't matter.
 
Lindsay-Jean H.
Lindsay-Jean H. December 1, 2015
This article (https://food52.com/blog/13333-5-common-homemade-ice-cream-issues-how-to-fix-them) talks about how swapping dairy products or changing ratios can drastically mess with the ice cream, so if you don't feel like chancing the results, you might try using a recipe designed for skim milk, like this one: http://www.marthastewart.com/337656/vanilla-ice-cream
 
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