Chill out: Ice-cream desserts are perfect when the weather's hot

When you want to chill out, there's nothing better than ice cream. (Remember, "stressed" spelled backward is "desserts.")

Well, we have what you need. None of these recipes require turning on a stove or heating up the oven. The freezer does most of the work.

Our Margarita Pie takes just a couple of ingredients and a few minutes to assemble. You could vary it by using your favorite kind of topping or flavoring instead of the limeade concentrate that the recipe calls for.

The homemade ice cream likewise requires only a few ingredients and doesn't require an ice cream maker to achieve its rich flavor and smooth consistency. Both are pretty easy to do.

For the fancier treats, we drew inspiration from "The Scoop," by Lori Longbotham, which boasts "how to change store-bought ice cream into fabulous desserts."

We took some of her ideas and experimented and embellished on them in the Deseret Morning News test kitchen, with mixed results. (Don't worry; we're only printing the recipes that actually worked .)

• Ice cream desserts need planning because of the chilling time. If you're layering different flavors of ice cream, sorbet, gelato and sauces, each layer needs to be firmly frozen before adding another layer, or they melt into each other. (Trust us on this — we found out the hard way.)

• It helps to use premium ice cream in making ice-cream cakes or pies, or in any dessert where the ice cream is softened and then refrozen. The higher butterfat content can help keep the refrozen ice cream from getting icy. Also, premium ice creams have less air beaten into them during manufacturing — a process called "overrun." This aeration, or overrun, keeps the mixture from becoming a solid mass. Economy-brand ice creams seem more cotton-y because they have more air whipped into them than premium ice creams, which are heavier, denser and richer. (That's why premium ice creams cost more.)

• Because of their lack of fat and more whipped-in air, "light" or "low-fat" ice cream tends to melt more quickly and forms ice crystals easier. If you're using these, you'll want to assemble the dessert quickly and get it back into the freezer so melting is kept to a minimum. The melting and refreezing make ice crystals, and that's when you get that "fridge-itis" taste.

• Store the ice cream in the main part of the freezer, not in the freezer door, where temperatures fluctuate.