This unique dessert tastes a little like fried ice cream bars, without any frying! It’s a delicious mixture of rice krispies, toasted coconut and pecans and brown sugar that’s toasted in the oven with butter and then used to sandwich vanilla ice cream in the center. It’s perfect for potlucks and family get-togethers, or simply a fun treat at home. This recipe comes from our good family friend, Linda Pope. BYU basketball fans might recognize that last name- she’s the mom of now head coach Mark Pope. Our families grew up together and my Mom got this recipe from her over 20 years ago and we’ve been making it ever since!
Ice Cream Crunch Bars
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups Rice Krispie Cereal
- 1 cups chopped pecans
- 1 1/2 cups shredded sweetened coconut
- 3/4 cups brown sugar
- optional: a few shakes of cinnamon
- 8 tablespoons real butter 1 stick, melted
- 1/2 gallon vanilla ice cream or one 'carton' since they keep shrinking, softened to the consistency of soft serve (see note)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Line a 9x13 inch pan with foil or a parchment sling, extending a little over the edges of pan.
- Place Rice Krispies, pecans, coconut, and brown sugar in a 9x13 inch pan. Drizzle butter over mixture and combine well (a fork, or clean hands work well.) If desired, sprinkle in a few shakes of ground cinnamon and mix in. Bake for about 30 minutes, stirring once or twice during cooking time. Remove from oven when toasted and golden brown and let mixture cool completely.
- Remove half of crispy mixture and spread remaining half in an even layer on the bottom of pan. Gently spoon softened ice cream on top of mixture. Use a spoon and very gently spread mixture, being careful to not lift up crisp from bottom of pan. (see notes for a tip). Spread ice cream out evenly and then top with remaining crisp mixture. Gently press top crisp into ice cream with hands. Cover pan with plastic or foil and chill until firm (preferably overnight.) When ready to serve, use foil/parchment to completely remove ice cream from pan. Slice into squares and serve.
Notes
How to Make the Topping
This doesn’t seem like much, but this is where the magic is. Mix rice krispies, coconut, brown sugar, pecans, and melted butter and slowly toast them in the oven. If you have a nut allergy, just leave out the nuts and make it up with extra krispies and coconut.
Together, you get sweet, crunchy, chewy, and crispy with so many great natural flavors and textures. It might seem like a weird, or simple combination, but stick with me. Half of this mixture gets spread on the bottom of a 9×13 pan.
Spread on your Ice Cream
It’s important that your ice cream is very soft. Not melted, but soft. Think soft serve that comes out of a machine; that’s the perfect texture.
Softening the Ice Cream: I’ve found it helps to tear off ice cream container and place the whole frozen block into a large bowl. Use a sharp knife to cut it into several large chunks. At this point you can leave it at room temperature for a while, or very carefully microwave at a low heat to gently soften, stirring in between. The consistency you’re going for is soft serve ice cream. It helps to stir it vigorously as it softens until it’s nice and smooth. As you place your ice cream on your crisp mixture, try to plop it on as evenly as you can.
Spreading the Ice Cream
If you’re not careful, you will mix up your bottom layer of crisp. With your ice cream very soft and smooth, just spoon large spoonfuls as evenly as possible in your 9×13 pan. Avoid dumping the whole thing in there at once. Stand next to your sink with hot water running and use a large metal spoon dipped in the hot water to spread ice cream. The eat will help it glide over the ice cream smoothly and make the process much easier! Continue dipping and spreading until it’s smooth.
Top your ice cream with the remaining crisp mixture.
Once it’s frozen back up again, use your parchment or foil to lift the whole thing out of the pan and slice into squares.
I like these in small bowls with a spoon or fork. They are AMAZING! Especially after it’s softened just a little bit, like 5 minutes, and the ice cream just sort of melts in your mouth and the flavors from the caramelized, toasted coconut and nuts come through with an added crisp from the cereal.
Questions & Reviews
Just made these for the first time. They were awesome!
I’m going to add a layer of mini chocolate chips to the top and bottom of the ice cream layer. We use pretzels with this because of nut allergies.
I’ll take a dozen please 🙂 Looks fantastic, even if the ingredients seem a little bit odd together at first.
Just found your blog today and I’m stoked. This recipe, the fruit rollups, and the one ingredient ice cream are gonna get me a lot of “You are the BEST Momma ever” comments from my little one. THANK YOU!
This was so easy, and insanely delicious. That combination is dangerous 🙂 I also cooked mine in a frying pan. Super easy and doesn’t heat up the house!
I just made these and didn’t feel like using the oven. I put everything in my largest straight sided saute pan and cooked it over medium heat…stirring constantly when things started to really sizzle. Took about 15-20 minutes. I think it worked well…just make sure to keep an eye on it.
Ok…I know I’m leaving comments on an old recipe, but I always skim through the comments before I make something for the first time, so I figured I’d leave another tip in case someone reads this. I bought the rectangular carton of ice cream, took it directly from the freezer, removed the carton from around it by pulling apart the seams, then just sliced the “brick” of ice cream into slabs and laid them over the crunchies in the bottom of the pan. For my 9×13 pan, 6 slabs would have worked pretty much perfectly (I had to do a little trial and error, but I’ll know for next time). I just took a spatula after I had them all laid in there and sort of smushed the seams together a little bit, and I think it worked great. No worries about getting the ice cream melted to just the right consistency…and less ice cream “shrink” because the air isn’t melting out of it.
Sorry…forgot to mention that I was inspired by Cindi’s post above mine to do this…just without the individual assembly part 🙂
Ice cream comes in those cardboard containers and crystalizes if it is in the freezer for a while. What can I put it in to keep it longer? I remember my grandmother had a special glass ice cream container she always put hers in.
Sorry, no idea. Eat it fast? lol
I just wanted to add that we make these all the time but we do not soften the icecream that much. We just let it sit out for about 7 minutes so it is not real hard and easy to slice with a sharp knife. Open the carton of icecream so you have a “block” of icecream, cut down the middle to make 2 blocks. Now slice the icecream into 1/2 inch slices and press both sides into the coconut mixture to coat well. Put the slices on a big cookie sheet and cover with saran wrap and put in freezer for at least a couple hours. Then you can wrap each one separately and eat as desired….if they last that long.
I wanted to make a nut-free version of this (I love nuts but my son is allergic) so I substituted crushed chocolate cookies for the pecans and used cookies and cream ice cream. So delicious!
I have been making this recipe for years, but with the addition of a delicious sauce. Try it with your favorite strawberry sauce and fresh strawberries. You won’t regret it! Yummmm!
Oohh. Yum. And if you added in a sprinkling of the crunchy magic shell oreo yummy stuff I think I would have a hard time not eating the entire PAN!!