I have always fancied trying my hand at making ice cream and this week I got the opportunity to review an ice cream maker from Savisto. This particular one was red (the same as my other kitchen appliances) and everyone in the house was excited to try it out.

The first thing that is important to note, is that making ice cream does need an element of forethought and preparation. The base of the ice cream maker needs to go in the freezer at least 12 hours before you want to make the ice cream – and the mixture you’re using to make the ice cream, needs to be mixed up and chilled too. Since the one we tried actually required heating milk and cream together, cooling and then chilling took the same amount of time as freezing the base (basically overnight).

Once we decided on the flavour we wanted to make (honeycomb), we bought the ingredients, placed the base in the freezer and mixed up the ingredients. As I mentioned before, the mixture needed to cool so it was all left overnight and made the next morning. The ice cream maker comes with both instructions and an ice cream recipes book so it was nice to not have to go looking for ice cream recipes.

Actually making the ice cream is super easy. Take the base out of the freezer and place the mixture into the bowl. Add the whisk to the lid and place (lock) on top. Plug in and turn on. You then just press to start and you’re away. The bowl mixes the ice cream for the set time (automatically set to 40 minutes) and once it’s finished, your ice cream is made.

When the ice cream is first made, its very soft scoop (which I loved). However we placed it in an old ice cream tub (I’d saved it and washed it out, knowing we would make ice cream during the week) and placed it back in the freezer to set a bit more. Later on, I used another recipe from the back of the recipe book to make some sauces and we served it up as desert after dinner.

So how would I rate the ice cream maker? It was pretty awesome. Set up and preparation were easy, other than needing to know you wanted to make ice cream at least 12 hours in advance. Making the ice cream took only 40 minutes and there is a chute on the lid so you can add ingredients towards the end (we did this with the honeycomb). The ice cream maker does all the work so you really don’t have to do anything. Once its done you can just scoop it all out and place into a tub to store. Cleaning the ice cream maker was also really easy and I just rinsed it under the tap and its now ready to go again.