Cuisinart ICE-45 Mix It In Soft Serve 1-1/2-Quart Ice-Cream Maker, White
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Kitchen and Housewares Reviews of Cuisinart ICE-45 Mix It In Soft Serve 1-1/2-Quart Ice-Cream Maker, White
Customer Review: What you see is what you get
Summary: 5 Stars
For those of you who are thinking of purchasing this machine and are wondering whether or not to believe the 5-star reviews or the 1-star reviews, let me assure you that if you follow the instructions provided, this machine absolutely works. You do not need a special freezer or any prior experience using ice cream makers.
I got mine about a week ago and have used it twice. The first time, I froze the bowl in my refrigerator's freezer compartment for about 20 hours. I mixed up the the simple vanilla recipe provided in the recipe booklet and let it sit in the fridge for about 15 minutes. Then I poured the mixture into the machine and turned it on. Unfortunately, I let it mix too long, and it became too thick to dispense from the machine. I had to scoop it out and eat it like normal ice cream, but it was still delicious.
The second time, I made the simple vanilla again, but I didn't chill the mixture prior to pouring it into the machine. I tested it more frequently as it mixed this time and found that it was the perfect consistency after about 15 minutes. It dispensed from the machine beautifully and stayed frozen long enough for me to finish it. I could not have asked for better soft-serve.
The key to getting great results from this machine is checking the consistency of the ice cream frequently. As others have said, there is a small window of time between too thin to eat and too thick to dispense, but that is the nature of soft-serve ice cream. If you're willing to test the consistency often enough, you will not be disappointed in the results.
A technique that I learned ... watch the ice cream as it mixes in the machine. Once it starts to look like it's developing some texture (it looks "icy"), put a bowl or cup under the spout and try to dispense some. If it's too thin for your liking, simply pour it back into the machine and continue mixing. After 1 or 2 minutes, test it again. Keep following this procedure. Eventually, you will get a smooth stream of soft-serve ice cream. The important thing is not to wait too long between tests, or the ice cream will get too thick. Don't think you can just let it sit in the canister for a few minutes and it will soften; it won't. The canister gets cold enough that it will only harden the ice cream the longer it sits inside the bowl.
Another tip ... don't put the mix ins into the ice cream as it is mixing. They will only sink to the bottom of the canister and clog up the machine, so you won't be able to dispense regardless of the consistency of the ice cream.
Customer Review: Works great!
Summary: 5 Stars
I was a little hesitant to buy this since the reviews are basically split, but it works great for us. I have a regular freezer above my fridge and I turned it to its coldest setting. I keep the freezer bowl in the back (and center) of the freezer, directly in front of the cold air. The bowl gets so cold that I usually can't wash it within a few hours after making ice cream since water freezes on it immediately and paper towels break off and stick to it... Even regular towels leave fibers frozen to the side of the bowl.
The first time we made ice cream, we didn't get really good results. I think the reasons are that the bowl wasn't cold enough, and we used the lower-fat vanilla recipe which lacked heavy cream to make it the right consistancy. The second time we got it right. That tells you that even if you get bad results the first time, maybe you're doing something wrong and just try again!
Although the ice cream is good, I must say that it's NOT exactly the same as you'd buy at an ice cream stand. It's a little lighter & fluffier and not as solid. Actually we like it better when it's too cold to dispense, because it's colder & closer to the kind you'd buy. The mix-it-ins don't work very well for us, but we just sprinkle the toppings on afterwards if we want them. So far we've tried the simple vanilla, chocolate, mint, strawberry-banana frozen yogurt and orange creamsicle sherbert. We did not like the chocolate at all, but the others were pretty good (You should use half mint and half vanilla extract for the mint ice cream because it tastes too much like double-mint gum if you don't). I always reduce the amount of sugar by half, and it's still very sweet. Also it usually takes 20-25 minutes to make, unless you're making less than half the recipe. Eventually I'll have all the recipes modified to our taste after trial and error.
As to the clean-up, other than the freezer bowl which I find has to defrost before washing & re-freezing, cleaning everything is pretty easy. I take all the pieces apart and let them sit in hot soapy water for a few minutes.
I ended up buying another bowl so we can make two kinds at once. Overall we're really happy. We haven't had any store-bought ice cream since we got this, although I have spent about $70 in ingredients! I think I went a little overboard though, at least now I'll only have to re-stock the milk and cream.
Check out the pictures I uploaded; I think our results look better than the pictures on the box!
Customer Review: fun, but the mix-it-in novelty does wear off
Summary: 3 Stars
I bought the Cuisinart Mix-It-In ice cream maker from a friend who'd never used it, and I have since sold it. Why? Well, while it does what it says -- makes yummy soft-serve ice cream and dispenses toppings -- it's not really very practical and the novelty wears off fairly quickly. Plus, 1.5 quarts of ice cream is not enough for a party, which is why I really wanted it. The manual says it makes 10 half-cup servings, but we found it really made 7-8 decently sized servings.
We used it three times, and each time we made the strawberry ice cream because we had fresh-picked strawberries to use. It was very easy...we pureed the berries and mixed all the ingredients, turned on the ice cream maker and poured in the mixture. We adults and the kids had fun watching it work, and in about 20 minutes, we had YUMMY ice cream to eat. If you run the machine 1-2 minutes longer, the ice cream sets better and dispenses better, without melting as quickly.
The dispenser can be challenging to operate...I don't know how on earth they got those perfect swirls in the product photo! The machine has to be on for it to dispense, and there's a limited amount of room beneath the dispenser, so when using our own bowls, it was harder to swirl it. Dispensing the toppings is a bit messy, and you HAVE to be sure not to use bigger topping except in the one container that can hold them. We only used the topping dispensers the first time we used the machine, because it wasn't worth it...much easier to just shake sprinkles out of the containers they come in. My kids loved the novelty of that feature, though, and didn't like my being practical about it!!
I decided to sell this ice cream maker because 1) it's not worth the novelty, 2) it takes up a ton of space (I kept the machine in the box and the bowl in the freezer, which you need to do if you want to make ice cream on a whim; not a problem, and 3) I bought the 2-quart ice cream attachment for my Kitchenaid mixer. All I have to do with that is store the bowl in the freezer...nothing else. And when I wanted to make a double batch of ice cream before getting the Kitchenaid bowl, I borrowed a neighbor's Cuisinart ice cream maker, the basic one, and it worked great without taking up all the space of this one. It doesn't dispense, which is fine and less of a mess to clean up.
So I would recommend spending $40 on the other Cuisinart one or getting the attachment if you have a Kitchenaid. The Mix-It-In one just isn't worth the novelty.
Customer Review: Very kid friendly. Enjoyable to use. Easy cleanup.
Summary: 5 Stars
Hi,
I received this as a gift. Started out with the vanilla ice cream recipe. Followed it exactly. Tasted wonderful. Our kids had fun mixing the ingredients and waiting for the soft serve to be ready. I agree with the other posters that it takes longer than 15 minutes. Was worried at 15 minutes that something was wrong. Having used the machine now, I would say about 25 minutes gets the ice cream ready. If the ice cream is runny. Wait. It is ready when the ice cream comes out thick and long.
We keep the bowl for the ice cream maker in the freezer so that it is ready at any time.
Cleanup is very easy. A little soap and water for the plastic parts. I just rinse the bowl out with water and put it straight back into the freezer. Paper towels will stick to the inside (cold) if you try drying it that way.....
We made the lemon sorbet today. We made the sugar water solution the previous day so that it could cool in the fridge. Today, the kids squeezed the lemons and the sorbet came out great.
It seems that most of the negative reviews are for a few constant reasons. One...No the ice cream maker does not mix the ingredients for you. All it does is mix the ice cream mixture into ice cream. No different than a rock salt ice cream maker. But the Cuisinart is much easier.
Two..."My home freezer doesnt get my bowl cold enough." I have a few thoughts. First. Maybe you need to put a thermometer in your freezer and see how cold it is. If your freezer is above 10 degrees, you should turn the temp down. A regular freezer should be around 5 degrees to 0 or below. I am talking about like a Sears freezer, not some special freezer.
I could see where the top freezer on a fridge might have trouble holding that temp if it is opened often. We use our standup freezer in the basement. Also, if your ice cream comes out runny, maybe you have not waited long enough. It takes about 25 minutes for me.
On a side note. This ice cream maker produces a good amount of ice cream. It serves about 8 people. We are talking about whole cream and sugar here. You really shouldnt make the servings huge if you want to enjoy the Cuisinart often.
Again, we like the machine. Clean up is a breeze. I mean, you are cleaning up ice cream...not very hard to do. Enjoy.
Customer Review: Probably worth the read
Summary: 1 Stars
After reading the 20+ 1 star reviews and the 40+ 5 star reviews I decided to pick it up and see what the deal was. The number one issue here was people were having a really tough time getting it cold enough, I really thought people were just being dramatic about it but infact it was very difficult for me to even get it to freeze, I have an empty fridge/freezer combo I put the bowl in the freezer at -4 degrees for a little over 24 hours without opening it, the mixture was refridgerated the same amount of time at about 30 degrees. The first day I tried it the bowl still had the smallest amount of liquid still slushing around inside (still not sure how the whole thing didn't freeze by then) but I decided to try it out anyways, after the recomended 30 minutes there was no change to the ice cream mixture, after 1 hour it started to crystallze a bit but by then the bowl of course was starting to warm up.
I cleaned the bowl, put it back in the same conditions (only colder this time, about -6 degrees) for just about two days. After the recomended 30 minutes the mixture showed some promise, it was thickening up really well but still much thinner than a Wendy's Frosty. I checked on the mixture every 10 minutes but after an hour it just started to warm up too much and never made any progress past the original state. Now I have to say it's pretty cold in my house, 67 degrees on average, and I have a smaller Cuisinart ice cream maker so I'm pretty familiar with how to get the best out of them for the most part, so I had this machine wrapped with a towel to keep in as much cold in as I could, plus the top was covered.
So in conclusion, in the freezer at -6 degrees, just under 48 hours with a mixture that was as cold as it could be in a normal empty fridge in a 67 degree house with the machine wrapped up I still could not get it to make anything more than a Frosty knockoff. That aside I'm sure if you have a chill chest of some kind that can get the bowl below 15 degrees and if you can make it in winter in a shed (or maybe some place less dramatic), then maybe it will get cold enough but if your like me than you'll ignore all the bad ratings and pick it up yourself and give it a shot. By the way if anyone has tips on how to get this thing cold enough with a normal freezer than comment on this review and I'd love to give it a try.