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Cuisinart ICE-21TQ Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker, Turquoise by Cuisinart
Product SummaryManufacturer: Cuisinart Brand: Cuisinart Model: ICE-21TQ Color: Turquoise Product features: - New mixing paddle makes frozen desserts and drinks in 20 minutes or less
- Large capacity makes up to 1-1/2-quarts
- Double insulated freezer bowl eliminates the need for ice
- Easy lock transparent lid with large spout makes adding ingredients simple and mess free
- Fully automatic with large ingredient spout for adding ingredients
Kitchen and Housewares Reviews of Cuisinart ICE-21TQ Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker, TurquoiseCustomer Review: It's also the perfect appliance to add to your bar! (UPDATED Review) Summary: 5 Stars
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
This is an updated review with information offered in a chronological manner.
Original Review:
I didn't really expect to throw together some ingredients, flip a switch and have ice cream a mere 20 minutes later. I expected a soft serve of sorts, but what I have gotten in two out of three batches is a not-so-thick shake-like slurry. That said, the machine DOES make something close to soft serve if the conditions are right.
Here are my recommendations:
Freeze the bowl in the coldest freezer you have (make sure you set the freezer to your coldest setting). My kitchen freezer isn't cold enough. Also, make sure you seat the bowl on its flat bottom so that the stuff inside it that freezes don't freeze unevenly and cause issues when it's spinning. Freeze it for at least 24 hours - a few days is preferable. I've decided to just store mine in the deep freeze.
Mix your ingredients ahead of time and get them as cold as you possibly can (without freezing them) before you put them in the machine. Ice crystals happen when freezing takes too long. The colder the ingredients, the faster your machine will "freeze" it (or get it close to freezing) and the less ice crystals will form in your ice cream.
When you go to freeze the "soft serve" try to put it in a container that fits it with just a little room to spare for expansion and make sure it has a tight lid. Too much air will change the consistency of the ice cream - less air is better.
The timing to make a batch of ice cream looks something like this: at least 24 hours to freeze the bowl, 20 minutes to run in the machine (assuming you did all your recipe prep work while the bowl was freezing, including super chilling the liquid before attempting to freeze it), and about 3 hours in a deep freeze to harden the "soft serve" enough to actually be called ice cream. Amazon has a video posted for this product and the ice cream shown in that video would have had to have been frozen overnight to get that firm, for example.
I loved the blue color of this machine. I just looks like an ice cream shop to me. It doesn't match a single thing in my kitchen, but I'm not going to devote permanent counter space to an appliance I just use occasionally anyway. It is surprisingly light weight as it is made entirely of plastic (except for the bowl). When running it's about as loud as my washing machine is when it's on delicate mode. I know that's a subjective description, but there you go: it's not unbearably loud, but neither is it unobtrusively quiet.
Buy a copy of Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book. Just do it. In fact, this book, in conjunction with the ice cream maker, makes for a perfect wedding or bridal shower gift. The recipes are easy to follow and include many of the most popular flavors. My very first batch, I made my most favorite: Cherry Garcia. It is interesting to note that this batch was by far the thickest I've made so far. I think it's because I used frozen cherries. The mocha recipes are awesome too.
Enjoy!
Added April 24, 2011:
I've been using this appliance for about three weeks now and have been so impressed with its performance where making sorbets is concerned, I felt moved to upgrade my original review from 4 stars to 5. In fact, I think this machine is first a sorbet maker and an ice cream maker second as the non-dairy ingredients used in sorbets seem to freeze much more efficiently than dairy recipes and thus deliver a thicker product straight out of the machine.
Sorbet is basically frozen fruit juice. The basic recipe is to dissolve 1 and 1/2 cups of sugar and a dash of salt in 2 cups of water (or water based juices) and as much fresh/frozen fruit as you like. Blend it all up, strain out the pulp, and then cool the resulting syrup in the refrigerator for an hour before freezing. You can also make varieties that don't have fruit in them. So far we've hit home runs making brewed chai and mocha sorbets. Just follow the basic recipe, but leave out the fruit. We also use less sugar, but that is a matter of taste and based upon experimentation. To make Chai, I brew 2 cups of water with 3 teabags until it reaches room temperature. For mocha, I use good quality cocoa powder and hot water with a teaspoon of good quality freeze dried coffee. (Starbucks offers some gourmet varieties: Starbucks VIA Ready Brew Coffee, Colombia, 3.3-Gram Packages (Pack of 50)). Both make a yummy frozen treat. These concoctions also blend easily with your favorite coffee liqueur to make refreshing dessert drinks that are not only tasty, but also delivers a smooth, ice chunk free consistency. Indeed, the fruit sorbets combine really well with clear liquors such as rum,vodka, and tequila to make some of the most refreshing summer drinks you'll ever whip up in your own kitchen.
I have a second refrigerator/freezer combo in my garage. I store the bowl of the machine in the freezer and the actual appliance itself in the refrigerator to help boost the efficiency of the freezing process. I make batches of liquid sorbet in advance so I have them for freezing on demand. These are just stored in air tight containers in my second refrigerator. I also use small single serving storage containers with lids to store frozen batches of sorbet for later use. These tend to get really hard so to use them, I break out my blender to mix high quality frozen cocktails that are a lot better than those you'll get from a bartender. Imagine making a fresh batch of sorbet and immediately adding a shot of your favorite liquor to your glass. Yum! We had house guests last weekend and we were all delighted by the different frozen drinks we concocted for ourselves.
My next purchase will be to buy a second freezing bowl! Amazon sells this one and it seems to be the same model number that Cuisinart uses for this machine as well:Cuisinart 1-1/2-Quart Additional Freezer Bowl, fits ICE-20 Ice Cream Maker.
Description of Cuisinart ICE-21TQ Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker, TurquoiseNow you can enjoy the finest homemade frozen treats at home! The fully automatic Cuisinart Frozen Yogurt-Ice Cream & Sorbet Maker lets you make your favorites in 20 minutes or less, with no fuss and no mess. Just add ingredients to the bowl, press ON and the machine does the rest!
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