Tessa’s Recipe Rundown
Taste: Like mint chocolate chip ice cream, but even better.
Texture: The crust is crunchy yet buttery, and the ice cream is smooth and creamy with a little crunch from the miniature chocolate chips. The ganache is thick, luscious, and fudgy, elevating the whole dessert!
Ease: The three parts of this recipe are all easy in themselves, but you will need some time and you will dirty some dishes.
Pros: Who doesn’t love a frozen pie?!
Cons: As mentioned above, this recipe does make a bit of a mess.
Would I make this again? Oh yes.
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This Frozen Mint Chocolate Chip Pie is perfect for summertime celebrations, cookouts, or even St. Patrick’s Day!
This pie is basically all of your mint chip dreams come true.
Since it’s frozen, it’s made ahead of time by nature. That means it’s perfect to bring to serve at any summer BBQ, party, or potluck.
One of my favorite parts of this pie is the Mint Oreo crust. I want as much chocolate + mint goodness as I can get!
Truly, this Frozen Mint Chocolate Chip Pie is everything a dessert should be. It’s rich yet refreshing, chocolaty and frosty, and full of some of my favorite textures.
Even people who don’t like mint chocolate chip ice cream (who are those people?!) love this pie.
Make this frosty treat soon – I just know it won’t last long in your freezer!
Sprinkle of Science
How to Make Frozen Mint Chocolate Chip Pie
How to Make an Oreo Cookie Crust
- I recommend using mint-flavored Oreos for a strong pack of mint chocolate flavor – but feel free to use regular Oreos instead.
- Keeping the filling intact, pulse the cookies until very finely ground. Add the melted butter and pulse until the mixture resembles wet sand.
- Press firmly into the springform pan. This pan makes it easier to remove the pie from the pan and serve once it’s ready. I like to use a tamper or the bottom of a glass or measuring cup to tightly press the crust into the pan, so it doesn’t crumble when serving.
- Bake for 10 minutes, then let cool before placing in the freezer while you make the ice cream filling.
Tips for Homemade Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream
- For the quickest, easiest, and best way to make homemade ice cream, you’ll need an ice cream machine.
- Make sure your ice cream maker freezer bowl is completely frozen solid. Give it a shake – if you can hear any liquid moving in the interior lining of the bowl then it’s not cold enough. And if that’s the case, you’ll end up with soup instead of ice cream.
- Make sure your cream and milk are very cold before combining the ice cream ingredients and churning. This will also help ensure you end up with a thick and creamy ice cream.
The Mint Chocolate Chip Flavor
Be sure to use peppermint extract, not mint or spearmint extract.
Do I Have to Use Corn Syrup?
The corn syrup helps keep the ice cream soft and prevents ice crystals from forming. You can use golden syrup or a tablespoon of vodka instead, if preferred. You can leave it out, but the pie might get hard faster.
Do I Have to Use Food Coloring?
Nope! That’s totally optional. If you do, I prefer Americolor gel food coloring. A little goes a long way. If you can’t find that then use Wilton gel food coloring.
How to Make Ice Cream Without a Machine
If you don’t have an ice cream machine, you’re in luck! I’ve written an entire article on how to make ice cream without an ice cream machine here.
Can I Just Use Store-Bought Ice Cream?
Sure! I think homemade is SO much better, but if you’re in a pinch, store-bought will work fine. You’ll need about 1 quart of softened store-bought ice cream.
How to Make Chocolate Ganache
- Ganache is so easy to make, and tastes so rich and decadent.
- Don’t let your cream get too hot (just starting to simmer is perfect) or it could burn your chocolate and fail to make a velvety ganache.
- We are adding a tablespoon of butter to give this ganache an even fudgier texture.
- If you want to learn more about chocolate ganache, check out my article on the topic here.
How to Store & Freeze Ice Cream Pie
Once the ganache has hardened on the Frozen Mint Chocolate Chip Pie, the entire pie can be covered with plastic wrap and stored in the freezer for up to 1 week. Allow the pie to sit at room temperature for 5 to 15 minutes before slicing and serving. The more solid and frozen the pie is, the longer it’ll need to sit at room temperature.
More Recipes You’ll Love:
- No Bake Frozen Chocolate Raspberry Pie
- Death by Chocolate Ice Cream
- Mint Chocolate Cupcakes
- Peppermint Chocolate Cake
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Frozen Mint Chocolate Chip Pie
Ingredients
For the crust:
- 20 (226 grams) mint Oreo cookies (keep filling intact)
- 4 tablespoons (57 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
For the mint chocolate chip ice cream:
- 2 cups heavy cream, chilled
- 2 cups whole milk, chilled
- 3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon corn syrup
- 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon
peppermint extract - 3 to 4 drops
green gel food coloring (optional) - 1 cup (224 grams) miniature chocolate chips
For the chocolate ganache:
- 4 ounces (113 grams) semisweet chocolate, chopped
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
Instructions
For the crust:
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Spray a 9-inch springform pan with nonstick cooking spray.
- In the bowl of a food processor, pulse the cookies until finely ground. Add the melted butter and pulse until moistened. Press the crumb mixture into the prepared pan, using the bottom of a measuring cup to press firmly into the bottom and up the sides of the pan. Bake for 10 minutes then cool completely. Cover and freeze the crust until ready to use.
For the ice cream:
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk together all of the ice cream ingredients except the chocolate chips until the sugar is dissolved. Pour into an ice cream maker and freeze according to the manufacturer’s directions. About 5 minutes before the ice cream is done churning, add the chocolate chips.
- Spread the ice cream into the pie crust. Press plastic wrap against the surface of the ice cream and freeze for at least one hour, or until firmed.
For the topping:
- Place the chocolate in a medium heatproof bowl. Place the cream in a small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a gentle simmer. Pour the cream over the chocolate and add the butter. Let stand for 3 minutes before stirring until smooth and shiny. Let cool slightly before pouring over the ice cream. Freeze until firmed, about 3 hours or overnight.
- The pie can be stored wrapped in plastic in the freezer for up to 1 week. The colder the pie is, the easier to will be to cut nice clean pieces of pie.
This recipe was originally published in 2014 and recently updated with recipe improvements, tips, and new photos. Photos by Ashley McLaughlin.
Hi Tessa- I want to make this for a crowd, 20-24 ish. Can this be made in 2 13″ X 9″ pyrex pans instead of the springform pan? Will it still come easily out of the pan? Also, I do not have the ice cream maker, so I’ll be making the ice cream without it. Should that make any difference? Thanks so much for your help.
Hi Elana! We haven’t tried this ice cream pie in anything except a 9-inch springform pan, but might work – just keep in mind that it will be much more difficult to get out – and more difficult to achieve nicely-presented slices. Also, the larger the pan, the thinner the crust/ice cream/topping will be. I would recommend doubling the recipe for each 9×13 pan – just be careful that you don’t overfill the pans (the recipe wasn’t designed for this, so it might take some tinkering). Be sure to read through all Tessa’s wonderful tips in the pink tip box, above the recipe, before you start! Also, check out Tessa’s article about making ice cream without an ice cream machine! Good luck and happy baking! 🙂
Why is this ice cream cake only good for 1 week in the freezer? How can you make it last a month?
Hi Bri! While homemade ice cream technically lasts longer than a week, it does start to lose its “fresh” texture and taste. Homemade ice cream doesn’t usually have as much air churned into it as store-bought, resulting in more ice crystals as the ice cream “ages”. It may still taste delicious after that point, but we still recommend storing this pie for one week for best results.
Out of this world!
I had some issues, but nothing unresolvable. I used a 7 1/2″ springform pan, so the crust was overly thick. I wasn’t sure if I should have run it up the side of the pan. The photos suggested the pie would look better with visible ice cream, so I only went up about 1/2″. I think that was good.
The ice cream did not freeze completely in the machine. I think this was because the machine was filled to capacity. Two batches might have worked better. (We store the machine in the freezer, so it wouldn’t have been colder – except that our deep freeze might not be set as cold as the fridge-freezer.) Solution: Harden the ice cream in the freezer before scooping into the crust.
The ganache was still a bit soft on the finished, frozen pie. This was not a problem, at all, but I am curious what affects the hardness of the ganache.
I will undoubtedly make this again!
Your pie looked delicious! I would definitely recommend using a 9-inch springform pan next time, but yours still looked incredible, and there’s nothing wrong with a really tall piece of ice cream pie! As for the ganache, it looked hardened in your picture! Did you let it set for at least 3 hours? The only other thing I can think of as to why the ganache didn’t harden is not enough chocolate chips were added. I’m guessing I know the answer as you bake all the time and do so well, but I still need to ask if you use a digital scale to measure your ingredients?
Definitely the digital scale! You sold me on it, and the scale method is so much more convenient.
The ganache may not have set for 3 hours. Also, I used a chocolate bar, no chips. I might use chips next time. It seems there was another recipe that used both chips and bars that may have been harder and I was remembering that. But chocolate is pretty much perfect in any form!
Good, haha, I figured you’d be using a scale 🙂 The ganache does call for a chocolate bar, so that’s completely fine, but you’re welcome to give it a try with both. I personally prefer bars only in ganache because chocolate chips have ingredients added to help them keep their chip shape, and since ganache only has two ingredients, I like to use the highest quality ingredients for the best flavor. 🙂
I don’t have an ice cream maker, so I made a no churn mint chocolate chip ice cream, but this was delicious! Probably one of my favorite desserts I’ve ever made.
Wow! That’s the ultimate compliment! You just made my day!
My family and I absolutely loved how this dessert came out!! It was so good, and we’ll definitely be making it again 🙂
Nice Mint Chocolate Chip Pie recipe thanks
A taste of summer! Yum! Easy. Just start it the day before you want to eat it so you really give the pie time solidly freeze. I may double the crust next time to make it thicker and have more crumbs to go up the side a bit. Follow instructions and you can’t fail. 🙂
This was delicious and ice cream was very creamy.