We love dessert in our house.

And I love to play the game of “use all leftovers, must.use.everything.in.the.fridge.and.freezer”

It’s a delusional game, but it gets me my jollies.  I know, weird.

Anyway, I usually win.

Except this one time when my mother-in-law asked if I wanted to save grilled hot dogs leftover from an afternoon BBQ.

Me: “No, I think I’m gonna draw the line there.  I mean, how many dishes can you REALLY use leftover hot dogs in??”

She agreed and we tossed them. If only I could get those dogs back!!  I was reminded the next day by a friend’s mom…”Oh, why not use them in Baked Beans?  Or chopped up in Mac & Cheese for the kids?”

Daggummit.  Guess I lost that round.

Anyway, dessert, let’s get back to what’s important.

We love ice cream sandwiches.  And I always find them to be a crowd pleaser.  In fact a crowd OVER ACHIEVER is more like it. Normally, I make them with chocolate wafers, vanilla ice cream, and Heath toffee bits.  But these sandwiches came about because I was about to leave town again, my dad had brought over grocery store bakery peanut butter cookies a few days earlier, and we had about 2 inches of ice cream left….

I find cutting open the ice cream carton is the easiest approach.  Had this been a new container, I would have sliced the ice cream an inch at a time after cutting off the carton, working quickly.

I’m a bit of a sucker for restarant supply stores.  I love to buy things that you normally only see at restarants.  Trust me, for the $15 you will spend for the 5000 of something, you will find a MILLION places to uses them!  Case in point, French Fry bags.  I’ve used these to give the kids snacks to take outside, to hold sliders at dinner parties, but most of all, to hold little cookie ice cream sandwiches.

Get all your supplies out, as the sandwiches need to be assembled in the shortest amount of time possible.  You want them back in the freezer, quick, quick, quick.

You will need:

The cookies (again I normally use Chocolate Wafers, but any cookie will do)

Ice Cream ~ whatever suits your fancy.  I love Ben & Jerrys’ Vanilla Heath Bar

Toppings for the sides ~ I would use Heath Toffee Bits if given the option.  They stick to the sides and are simply the BEST!  Place on a plate and set aside

A box or baking pan to line the finished sandwiches in stacked bags for the freezer.

I like to lay out a bunch of cookies face down to begin with.

I slice off ice cream, an inch at a time, and then cut equal portions of that slice.

Quickly place an individual piece on each cookie.  Don’t worry about shape, it will all taste the same in the end.  I made these a little full as I wanted to use all the ice cream and only had a few cookies.

Place a top on each sandwich, and roll them in the waiting topping plate.

I used peanut butter & milk chocolate chips this time as it’s what I had (but they don’t stick as well).

Heath Toffee bits truly are the bomb and are worth the drive to the grocery store.

Quickly slide the sandwich into the little bag and stack them on a tray, shoe box, baking pan, anything that lets you keep them all together and into the freezer.

Pull them out for dessert and watch your guests go CRAZY!  (I’m serious, they will go crazy!)  My hubs is always so glad when we have leftovers!

Enjoy!!