This is part 1 of a 2 part game night! I wanted to get this part out real quick, in time for National Ice Cream Day! So we’re beginning by talking about the best part of the meal, dessert! 😂We paired some ice cream treats with some creamy chaos in the games. Stay tuned tomorrow for Meatless Monday when I’ll share what we had for the main course.

At a Glance…

Brownie Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream

When I saw this recipe and its description, I knew it had to be made, especially for National Ice Cream Day. The Banana Diaries said “this is heavily inspired by the classic Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream flavor- the one with chunks and bits of chopped toffee bar with ripples of fudge and creamy coffee ice cream”, and that used to be one of my absolute favorites before becoming vegan! B&J has made a lot of delightful vegan flavors, but something like this can be really hard to find. I’m a sucker for coffee and toffee, so this is match made in heaven for me.

There are a lot of super simple vegan ice cream recipes. This is not one of them. 😂First you make brownie bites, which the original B&J Coffee Toffee Bar Brunch didn’t have, to my recollection. But I am not opposed to brownie bites, and I had a free Saturday, so make them I did. However, further along in the process, it definitely seemed like I made far too much brownie for what the ice cream could handle, so I’m not sure what happened there. Also, don’t be like me and forget to get more cashew butter, so you had to supplement with almond butter. And then run out of almond butter, so you have to supplement with peanut butter. Anyone allergic to nuts should stay far away from this batch of brownies lol. Soaking the dates in coffee was a fascinating idea!

I also made the mistake of trying to do this recipe during an Alberta heat wave with our little a/c unit not working, so the toffee never really firmed up and hardened into a crisp like I would’ve liked. I tried putting it in the fridge, and even freezer for a bit, but maybe not long enough. It was still quite gooey. 🫠

The fudge was easy enough, as was whipping up the ice cream itself, though after I got the heavy cream all whipped up nicely and started to add the other ingredients, it kinda turned back into a liquid-y soup. The recipe said to spoon it into the dish, but I was definitely pouring lol. It might’ve been because the espresso I made was still too hot and make everything melty. Rather than trying to layer a liquid, I just put everything into the casserole dish (though not all the brownie), and swirled it a bit and hoped for the best.

In the future, I don’t know that it needed the brownie bits. While they’re of course good, the extra effort and bits I don’t think were necessary and I’d rather just focus on the coffee & toffee. I didn’t even use as much as it called for, and it still seemed like a lot. Despite all the effort, it did indeed turn out fantastic and I will be enjoying it for days to come.

The Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream from Minimalist Baker is one I’ve made before, and it is so delicious! Growing up, my favorite flavor of ice cream, and the one I’d always request my birthday ice cream cake include, was mint chocolate chip. It was so fun to be able to make my own, with fresh and simple ingredients! This also worked well for my peanut free, sugar free friend (since the Coffee Toffee ice cream was definitely not sugar free haha). I used coconut oil instead of the cashew butter in the ice cream(to avoid ‘may contain peanuts’), and green food coloring, cause that’s what I had, and the ice cream whipped up nicely!

I paired this with some sugar free, nut free sandwich cookies from Detoxinista for my sugar-free friend, and some brownie sandwiches leftover from the brownie bits of the coffee ice cream for everyone else. This was definitely a cobbled together recipe from a few different places, lol, but it was hard finding a recipe that didn’t have peanuts (including ‘may contain’), and didn’t have refined/granulated sugar, and didn’t have caffeine (so Jon could have a late night option that wouldn’t keep him up). That’s ok, it was a challenge!

The Detoxinista sandwiches were super easy to make! They were the perfect thickness and were well received and appreciated by my sugar-free friend. I tried to use all the brownie batter I had leftover for everyone else with what I thought was an appropriate thickness, but I think I should have made more, less thick sandwiches. They were giant and dense! I think with a thinner cookie they would’ve worked much better, but the overall taste was still lovely.

Kitchen Rush

Kitchen Rush is a chaotic and silly game. We don’t pull it out often because you really have to be in the right mood for this kind of crazy, but it’s always fun when we do.

It is a real-time worker placement game, using sand timers as your workers! You are cooperatively trying to successfully run a kitchen, preparing dishes, cooking them, getting ingredients, washing dishes, etc., all within the allotted time. You have to get enough money to not only succeed as a restaurant, but also pay your workers. You might also, depending on the particularly goal you chose, need some stars of prestige to succeed.

The little bits of ingredients are fun components, and you actually have to search in a bag for your spices, mimicking the chaos of finding that one spice buried deep in your cupboard. This definitely gives video game vibes (I’ve never played it, but I hear there’s one like this), and it’s so satisfying when you all successfully accomplish your dishes in time! This particular evening, we of course had to play with the dessert expansion so we could keep with the theme of National Ice Cream Day! The little scoops do like to roll away if you’re not careful, and you have to keep the lid on the freezer or everything will melt! If you want a little chaos in your life, check this one out!

Want to buy these games? Check out your friendly local game store (FLGS), Amazon [here], or get a first-order discount at Board Game bliss [here].