Ice Cream Maker 2L, Pre-Freeze Bowl, Bottom-Drive, OPlace SU-506

I do love me some ice cream, but what I don't like about store brands is that they are substantially more sweet than I want them to be. I thought that I'd enjoy trying my hand at making ice cream instead, so I could come up with my own flavours and levels of sweetness.

This machine is really quite simple. A fairly large, a half gallon tub that you freeze ahead of time, that spins on its base. A plastic 'blade' component is held in place by the lid, and the tub rotates around it as you pour your mixture in. It then continues to turn for your set amount of time, their standard setting is 40 minutes, but you can stop it, or add to this time to achieve your desired consistency.

Temperature is key here. They instruct you to freeze the tub for 24 hours, which I did. When I took it out it seemed nice and cold and ready to use. I chose an old fashioned custard recipe, which I then chilled. I turned on the machine and poured the mixture into the bowl. I later realized that I had not chilled my mixture nearly long enough, as it had still not come close to ice cream consistency after an hour. The mixture ended up back in the fridge, and the ice cream bowl went back into the freezer, where they rested for 2 days as I was too busy to get to them.

My second attempt was significantly different. The bowl this time was much colder, feeling like a large block of ice. Working with a suitably chilled custard, this had no problems reaching ice cream consistency. The center of the bowl gave lovely, smooth cream similar in texture to soft-serve. The outside and bottom however had a layer of ice cream frozen to them, probably more like 'rolled' ice cream, more solid and almost crunchy. The plastic blade does not touch the sides or bottom of the bowl, and while this allows smooth movement of the bowl's mechanism, it also allows a layer to rest undisturbed against the frozen bowl. The inside ice cream is great, it's that outside stuff that isn't really.

My thought are that this is a pretty affordable machine, it's not overly loud and it does allow me to tailor the ice cream to my tastes. It does have a design flaw that takes it out of the 5 star range, but in the end, it works and I'm still going to be using it.

This ice cream maker is a great value at $70 and is a lot of fun to use. It works by freezing a bowl that has liquid inside, which then transfers that cold into the mix as the motorized base stirs it. I’ve done two Philadelphia-style vanilla batches so far, and they were absolutely amazing—way better than anything I could buy at the store.

I’ve found that using my deep freeze to get the bowl as cold as possible and letting the mix sit in the fridge for 24 hours makes a big difference. My first batch took 35 minutes and started to get a few butter molecules after churning that long, but the second batch was perfect in about 28 minutes because everything started out colder. While you might not necessarily save a ton of money making your own ice cream, the quality makes it definitely worth it in my book. The ice cream is a very soft serve right out of the bowl, but it isn't melting. It will get very firm if you freeze it overnight. Very happy I found this!

The motor isn't super quiet while it's mixing, but it isn't overbearing either—you can easily have a conversation while it’s running. In fact, it’s actually a cool conversation piece to have going when people are over. There are tons of recipes online, but so far the vanilla has been so delicious that I’m just really impressed with this thing.

firstt off, FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS! second, leave the inner bowl in the freezer a couple days before first use. third, make sure your mixture is chilled to the proper temp as well. we used this to make some choclate frozen yogurt, unfortunately i didn't wait as long as i should have for the bowl to freeze thinking 6+ hours was long enough. it was not and we ended up with almost frozen yogurt, until it went in the freezer itself. turned out great btw. it was not an included recipe, but i did use the included one as the base. i do want to try ice cream, but i shouldn't be eating ice cream. so... next will be strawberry ice cream. it was pretty easy to make to froyo. made the wife happy, so there's that. didn't get into to much trouble for "yet another kitchen gadget" becuase it makes something she likes and saved us money in the process. interested in making your own ice cream or froyo, this is smaller than most others. works well, if you follow directions and makes a decent amount. even includes its own scoop.

My boys love homemade ice cream, so we have tried several different ice cream makers over the years. This one has been a solid addition to the kitchen. The controls are simple, the machine is easy to operate, and it produces smooth, creamy ice cream with very little effort.

One feature I really appreciate is the visible feeding port. Being able to add chocolate chips, cookie pieces, fruit, or other mix-ins without stopping the machine is convenient, especially when making custom batches for the kids. The digital timer is also helpful because it takes the guesswork out of the process and allows you to fine-tune the consistency.

The 2.1-quart capacity is a nice size for a family. It makes enough for everyone without taking up an excessive amount of counter space. While it is not a commercial-grade machine, it does a great job for homemade ice cream, frozen yogurt, and sorbet. Overall, it is easy to use, produces good results, and has become a fun appliance for family dessert nights.

Finally, after three attempts of trying to make ice cream it came out right. I was about to give up because I was not sure that this was actually going to work. At first, I was putting the bowl in a mini fridge freezer, and I believe that is part of why I was not getting results. That being said, make sure you put this in a freezer that does in fact get cold enough. I do put the bowl in a plastic bag because this was a suggestion from the manual that helps prevent freezer burn. Here is what I did to finally make ice cream that I know I can do it again and will be using this machine many more times.

Make sure the bowl has been in the freezer for at least 24 hours.

Make sure all your ingredients are cold and if you are putting add in, I put those in the fridge for at least two hours as well.

START the machine before adding ingredients!!!

Here is what I used:

2 cups of heavy whipping cream

1 cup of whole milk

3/4 cup of sugar

A dash of vanilla (I measured with my heart)

*The last five minutes I added about 7 crushed Oreo's that I pulled from the fridge

Voila - Oreo Ice Cream! It is delicious and you can thank me later.