Back to School Apple Ice Cream Sandwiches

I can’t believe we’re in our final week of summer and the kids go back to school next week. They’re kind of ready and kind of dreading it … and I feel exactly the same. Two of my kids will be away at college again this year and the other three will be home, two in middle school and one in elementary. I feel like I need to cherish these years because I don’t have a whole lot of “first days” left. This year we’re celebrating a new school year with back to school apple ice cream sandwiches, an idea my twelve-year-old daughter came up with! It’s a simple recipe that uses red velvet cake mix cookies and vanilla ice cream. They’re super easy to make even if you don’t consider yourself overly crafty or culinary … and if you really want some fun, let the kids into the kitchen to help make them!

To make these easy back to school apple ice cream sandwiches, start by baking red velvet cake mix cookies.

You’ll need one red velvet cake mix, 1/3 cup vegetable oil, and 2 eggs. Stir the ingredients together in a bowl until the dry mix is well blended then use an ice cream scoop to scoop the dough onto a greased baking sheet.

Bake at 375 for seven minutes. Let the cookies cool completely then remove them from the baking sheet and place them in the freezer until fairly hard. If you don’t freeze the cookies first, they tend to break when you fill them with ice cream.

Let the vanilla ice cream soften at room temperature for a few minutes then place a scoop on a cookie, top it with another cookie, and press down slightly. You don’t want to squish it but you do want to squeeze the ice cream a bit.