Make Your Own Super-Easy Ice Cream Pie (2026 Guide)

Happy National Ice Cream Pie Day, celebrated on August 18. In 2026 the date falls on Tuesday, August 18. Did you know you can make your own ice cream pie at home? It is so easy: with some of your favorite ice cream (works with dairy or non-dairy ice creams) and a graham cracker or cookie crust, you can create a treat that is sure to please. The six variations below cover most of what an ice-cream-pie reader has ever written in to request.

Start With a Crust, Any Crust

Graham cracker, shortbread, chocolate cookie, gingersnap, vanilla wafer, even a pretzel crust will all hold the cold filling without going soggy. Homemade crusts run about 1.5 cups of cracker or cookie crumbs, 6 tablespoons of melted butter, and 2 tablespoons of sugar pressed into a 9-inch pie plate and baked at 350 F for 8 to 10 minutes. Cool fully before filling.

Make Your Own Ice Cream Pie: Basic Directions

In a bowl, combine one quart of your favorite ice cream (see below), softened, or buy vanilla ice cream and add your favorite ingredients like M&Ms, coconut, whatever you like (many ice cream combos we like are hard to find, so make your own). Stir to combine, and fill a prepared crust.

Cover with foil and place in the freezer for 2 to 3 hours until solidly frozen. Remove from freezer 10 to 15 minutes before slicing. Garnish the pie however you want: peanuts, chocolate sauce, berries.

Trying to save calories? Go crustless.

Pick the Best Day for It

The Almanac’s Best Days calendar tracks the right days for baking, entertaining, and dozens of other kitchen tasks, month by month, all year. Hand the dessert plan to the calendar.

See the Best Days Calendar

Try One of These Ice Cream Pie Specialties

• Coffee ice cream pie: add 2 to 3 tablespoons instant coffee and 2 tablespoons sugar to 1-quart vanilla ice cream and stir to blend well. Add to piecrust and freeze.
• Cookies-and-cream pie: crumble 4 Oreo cookies into vanilla ice cream and fold in. Add to piecrust and freeze.
• Apple pie a la mode: add 1 cup prepared apple pie filling to vanilla ice cream and stir. Add to graham-cracker piecrust and freeze.
• Easy key lime: add 6 oz frozen limeade concentrate to 1-quart vanilla ice cream. Stir until limeade dissolves. Pour into shortbread piecrust, top with whipped topping, and freeze.
• Lemonade ice cream pie: add 6 oz frozen lemonade concentrate to 1-quart vanilla ice cream. Stir until lemonade dissolves. Add to piecrust and freeze.
• Peanut butter ice cream pie: using a cookie crust, fill with peanut butter cup ice cream and top with melted chocolate, chocolate candy shell ice cream topping, or ganache. Then freeze.

Use Your Favorite Flavors

The easiest of all ice cream pies start with your favorite commercial specialty ice cream. Rocky Road, Butter Pecan, or Moose Tracks. There are so many creative flavors out there. Just scoop four cups of your favorite specialty ice cream into a bowl and stir to slightly soften. Fill a prepared graham cracker crust, cover, and place in the freezer for several hours until frozen.

Toppings

Once your pie is full, simply add toppings and drizzle over the top of your pie. Many ice cream sundae toppings serve this purpose. Pick one or as many as you want. Add these before you place in the freezer so they can set. You can also top them again (the more the merrier).

• Sliced fruit
• Nuts
• Caramel syrup
• Chocolate syrup
• Melted chocolate
• Mini chocolate or white chocolate chips
• Jimmies or sprinkles

Crust + Flavor Pairings That Always Work

Storage and Make-Ahead Tips

• Make-ahead window: up to a week in the freezer, sealed tightly with foil or a freezer-safe dome.
• Beyond a week: ice crystals start forming on the surface. Press a piece of parchment directly to the top of the pie to slow that down.
• Slicing trick: dip a long knife in hot water and wipe it dry between cuts for clean edges.
• If the pie is too hard to slice: 10 to 15 minutes on the counter does it. Anything longer and the bottom turns soft.
• Travel: tuck the dish into an insulated bag with a frozen gel pack for the drive to the cookout.

For a related summer treat, see our how to make snow ice cream guide. Reader-tested with the same kind of step-by-step ratios. According to the International Dairy Foods Association, the average American eats about 20 pounds of ice cream a year, so the chance of an ice cream pie audience is high.

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Deborah Tukua

Deborah Tukua is a natural living, healthy lifestyle writer and author of 7 non-fiction books, including Pearls of Garden Wisdom: Time-Saving Tips and Techniques from a Country Home, Pearls of Country Wisdom: Hints from a Small Town on Keeping Garden and Home, and Naturally Sweet Blender Treats. Tukua has been a writer for the Farmers' Almanac since 2004.

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