• Wafer ice cream cones (as many as needed)
• Vanilla ice cream (any brand)
• White frosting (can be store-bought or homemade)
• Blue fruit leather
• Red and blue decorating gels (found in your local supermarket or specialty bake store)
• Red and blue M&M’s
• Canister of ready-made whipped cream (while homemade is great, you need a canister that’s under pressure that will release the whipped cream to make Uncle Sam’s “beard”.

Directions

1. Place a scoop of vanilla ice cream on a plate and return it to the freezer to harden. Meanwhile, construct an Uncle Sam hat out of a wafer ice cream cone.
2. Smear frosting around the bottom of the cone to attach a blue band of fruit leather . Squirt vertical stripes of red decorating gel down the sides and blue gel on the top.
3. Using a star tip, squirt on white frosting stars around the blue fruit leather, if desired. If you don’t have a star tip, take a zip lock bag, fill with frosting, cut off the tip of one corner of the bag, now you can pipe dots. TIP: To avoid smudging the Uncle Sam hat design, have your child hold the cone from the inside while decorating it with fruit leather and icing.
4. Remove the ice cream-scoop “head” from the freezer and top with the Uncle Sam hat. Working quickly so the ice cream doesn’t melt, add blue M&M’s eyes and a red M&M’s nose. Finally, add a whipped cream beard. To do this, have your child hold the canister upside down while squirting on a long white beard.
5. Serve immediately.