Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker Review

This is a review of the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker. To be honest, what attracted me the most to this item is it's appealing appearance. It's a ball shaped ice cream maker that comes in the colors of blue, green, orange. pink, purple, red, sage green, clear, or glacier blue. You add the ingredients, then pass, shake, and roll it around for 15 minutes. After that, you should have a pint or quart of ice cream, depending on the size of the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker you have. It sounds great, but is it really worth the $30 to $40 pricetag? In my opinion, probably not. However, you may decide that it's perfect for your needs. So, without further ado...

The Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker comes in two sizes. You can get the regular 1 pint (16 oz) or the mega 1 quart (32 oz) size. The 1 pint is approximately 8" in diameter, and the 1 quart 9" in diameter. You add ice and salt to one end, and ice cream mix to the other. After moving the ball around for 15 minutes or so, your ice cream should be ready to eat. This could be a good product to take with you for outdoor activities such as camping.

One disadvantage of this product is that you cannot add regular sized, cubed ice. You need to crush it first. After sealing it up, it may still leak (mine did). Making it indoors is not optimal, since you may end up getting salt water everywhere. The Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker is not electrical. You're suppose to physically keep the ball moving while it's making the ice cream. It's breakable (made out of plastic), so you can't be too rough with it. It really doesn't roll very well, because it has a raised plastic design. You can pass it back and forth, but 15 minutes of that can get boring, even for kids.

The time it will take to make ice cream is not near exact. Of course, this is not really the fault of the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker. The ingredients, and motion of ball will be the influencing factors. It advertises it takes 10 minutes for the pint, and 15 minutes for the quart. In reality, it could take much longer. Then, you'll have to add more ice and salt, and play with the darn thing some more. When the ball is full, it's heavy (7 lbs. for the pint and 10 lbs. for the quart) and extremely cold. It has sharp plastic edges that can make your hands sore after awhile of playing. When you're finally done, the small opening to get the ice cream out can be kind of frustrating as well.

What I like about the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker is it's good looks. That's about it.