Chunky Monkey Copycat Ice Cream

/ Ice Cream / January 27, 2026
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This is an old fashioned flavor that combines Banana Ice Cream, Toasted Walnuts, and Chocolate Chunks

Chunky Monkey Copycat Ice Cream

This ice cream is made in Six steps. First, prepare the chocolate chunks. Second, toast the walnuts. Third, prepare the banana flavoring. Fourth, make the cornstarch thickening. Fifth, make the ice cream. Finally, after the ice cream is frozen, fold in the chocolate chunks and the toasted walnuts.
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Servings: 8 cups
Ingredients Instructions Notes

Ingredients
  

Chocolate Chunks
  • 4 oz Nestle Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips (=113 g)
  • 4 Tbs Butter (=56 g)
Toasted Walnuts
  • 1 cup Walnuts, chopped (=110 g)
  • 1 Tbsp Butter, melted (=14 g)
  • ¼ tsp Salt
Banana Flavor
  • 3 Bananas (=337 g)
  • 1/4 cup Light corn syrup (=80 g)
Cornstarch Thickening
  • 2 Tbsp Whole milk
  • 5 tsp Cornstarch
Ice Cream Base Mix
  • 1 cup Whole milk (=240 g)
  • 2 Whole pasteurized eggs (Large eggs)
  • 3/4 cup Sugar (=144 g)
  • Dash Salt
  • 2 cups Heavy whipping cream (=444 g, add later )

Instructions
 

Chocolate Chunks
  1. Combine the butter and the chocolate chips in a glass microwave safe bowl. Heat in microwave till melted (approximately 15-30 seconds), stir together until well blended and all lumps are gone.
  2. Pour onto silicone mat on cookie sheet and place in freezer until frozen very solid.
  3. Remove from silicone mat and place on cutting board. Cut into pea-sized chunks. This must be done quickly as the chocolate/butter mixture will soften and melt at room temperature. Immediately return chocolate chunks to freezer and reserve for later.
Toasted Walnuts
  1. Mix Toasted Walnut ingredients, put on silicone mat on cookie sheet and bake 16 minutes at 300 F stirring occasionally. Cool in freezer.
Banana Flavor
  1. Peel bananas, measure corn syrup, set aside.
Cornstarch Thickening
  1. Put cornstarch thickening ingredients in a small bowl. Whisk to make a smooth slurry. Set aside.
Ice Cream Base Mix
  1. Put 1 cup whole milk into a small saucepan. Heat to boiling. Whisk in the cornstarch slurry, boil 1 minute until thick. Remove from heat and cool to 150 degrees F.
  2. Add 2 whole eggs to milk mixture, whisk while heating back up to 160 degrees F. Immediately remove from heat, strain, put in Ziplock bag and seal, immerse in ice bath to cool completely.
  3. Put cooled milk and egg mixture, sugar, and salt into blender. Add banana flavor ingredients. Blend on High for 1 minute.
  4. Add whipping cream. Blend on Medium setting for 30 seconds.
  5. Freeze in ice cream machine.
Combine
  1. After ice cream is frozen, put it in a bowl and gently fold in the chocolate chunks and the toasted walnuts.

Notes

All of the banana ice cream variations we tried in the past turned icy over time in the freezer. This recipe did not turn icy and turned out much better than the other banana ice cream recipes we have tried. We modified the recipe in Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams at Home Banana Ice Cream recipe on p. 152. We used our base mix, used corn starch like Jeni’s to remove water from the bananas, and left out the cream cheese in Jeni’s recipe because we felt it added an unpleasant taste and mouth feel. Note that this recipe is prepared differently than all of our other ice cream recipes.

For more information see Adding Chocolate Chips to Ice Cream

For more information see Adding Nuts to Ice Cream

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