Protein Pistachio Ice Cream (Ninja Creami)

Yes, protein pistachio ice cream can be delicious and creamy. You just need a few simple ingredients and your Ninja Creami and you can make a rich and decadent sugar free low carb dessert that’s also high in protein.

You might also like the keto almond torte chia pudding.

Pistachios are very popular right now because of all the Dubai chocolate recipes and products. They just happen to be one of my hubby’s favorite snacks so I just had to make this low carb high protein pistachio ice cream in my favorite kitchen gadget – the Ninja Creami ice cream machine.

I only had to run this protein ice cream through the machine once and the result was a healthy keto dessert with a creamy texture. The pistachio flavor is now one of our favorites and if you want a bit of crunchy you can add in a shopped pistachios.

TIP 1: To learn more about the Ninja Creami machine and see all my 24+ recipes, check out this page. This ice cream machine works differently than most others. And recipes are mostly low carb and high protein but they are all healthy ice cream or sorbet recipes.

Recipe ingredients and substitutions.

The simple ingredients I used for this ice cream recipe is heavy cream, unsweetened almond milk, cream cheese, sweetener, vanilla protein powder, almond extract and pistachios.

• pistachios – Of course you should have some shelled pistachio nuts in this recipe. I added some at the end for a crunchy bite. However if you have a nut allergy or don’t like nuts but like the pistachio flavor all you really need is the almond extract.
• heavy cream, almond milk and cream cheese – These 3 ingredients are what make the creamy base of this protein ice cream. The heavy whipping cream is and cream cheese make this so creamy and the almond milk is a low calorie, low carb way to stretch out the base. You could substitute the dairy products with coconut milk or coconut cream but it might alter the taste a bit.
• almond extract and Swerve sweetener – The almond extract is what gives the pistachio taste. You should use it and it’s available at most grocery stores. I like Swerve sweeteners but you can whatever sweetener is your favorite. And if you don’t care about sugar or carbohydrates you can use regular white sugar.
• Isopure Zerocarb vanilla protein powder – This is my favorite protein powder as it has no carbs and I like the taste. I’ve tried so many and this is the best one for my purposes. You can use whatever vanilla protein powder you want. If you don’t care about protein you can eliminate it but you will have to add more sweetener to the base.

Note you can play around with this recipe if you are experienced with low carb high protein ice creams. Many of my recipes use sugar free instant pudding mix instead of the cream cheese. Plus I know they have a pistachio flavor. However instant pudding mix has more carbs even though they are sugar free. You can also try using vanilla protein shakes. I like FairLife shakes the best for this.

How to make keto protein pistachio ice cream in the Ninja Creami.

The day before you want to eat this make the base.

Step 1: To make the base, add the almond milk, heavy cream, cream cheese, protein powder, sweetener and almond extract to a high speed blender. You could also use a food processor. Blend until everything is well combined.

Pour into the pint container that came with the Ninja Creami ice cream machine. But make sure not to go past the Max Fill line. Attach the storage lid and place on a flat surface in the freezer overnight.

I bought extra Ninja Creami pints so I can have a different flavors to pick from whenever I want. Just make sure you buy the proper size container as there are different sizes for different Ninja Creami machines.

Step 2: When you are ready to eat this sweet treat, take off the store lid and place in the outer assembly bowl and secure the lid. Place in the Ninja Creami and use the LITE function.

This is what mine looked like after one cycle. It’s not powdery if you look at the top part. One scoop and it’s smooth and cream. If yours is powdery, just run it through one more LITE cycle and it should be ok.

You can also use the re-spin program. If it’s still powdery add a tablespoon of cream or almond milk and run it once more.

Step 3: If you want to add some chopped nuts you can either run it through the Mix-In program or just do it by hand. Sometimes the Mix-Ins process pulverizes the topping so I do use it much.

TIP 2: I find that I like to take some out and mix it by hand because if you don’t eat the whole thing you will have to run it through the machine again the next time you eat it and the nuts will just get chopped to tiny bits.

When done eating smooth the leftover into a flat surface for when you want to run it through the machine the next time. Please scroll down to view the printable recipe card.

TIP 3: Recently my husband ate the leftovers of this particular flavor by just heating it a up a bit in the microwave because he didn’t know how to run the machine. So you can try this but do it for just 10 seconds at a time. However running it through the machine would be better when eating leftovers.

TIP 4: If you want to get that Dubai chocolate effect you can try some different mix-ins or toppings. Keto chocolate chips or shavings from a dark chocolate bar would work great and still keep it low carb. The crunchy filo pastry (kataifi) would be high in carbs but if you happen to have that you could add a tablespoon or so and it might not add too many carbs. Just don’t use the mix in button for these because it will mix it too much. See TIP 2 below.

More keto protein Ninja Creami recipes to try.

I have over 24 ice cream recipes as of this writing! Most are low carb and high protein but they are all healthy ice cream or sorbet recipes.

Here are some of the most popular low carb and high protein Ninja Creami recipes:

• Ninja Creami strawberry or blueberry cheesecake
• Ninja Creami chocolate peanut butter or just peanut butter
• Ninja Creami orange creamsicle or cinnamon or coffee flavors
• Ninja Creami apple pie and berry crumble

I LOVED this low carb, high protein pistachio ice cream recipe as did my husband. He loved the chopped nuts in it and I loved the flavor and that it was sugar free and high protein.

To me there is nothing better than a bowl ice cream after dinner and not feeling guilty about it. Plus I’m really trying to add more protein to my diet and I just love my sweets. I hope you like it too!

The nutritional information is 358 calories / 29.4g fat / 5.6g carbs / 1.2g fiber / 16.2g protein

Without nuts 314 calories / 25.9g fat / 3.4g carbs / 0.4g fiber / 14.6g protein