Cuisinart FastFreeze ice cream maker review: a tasty triumph

Home ice cream makers have exploded in popularity over the last few years, but none of them work quite like the Cuisinart FastFreeze. Sure, I could spend this entire review comparing the Fast Freeze directly to the Ninja Creami, but that would be doing it a disservice. This isn’t a dupe: It’s a very innovative alternative that’s cheaper, faster, and less clutter-inducing.

I’ve been testing this handy frozen treat maker for a couple of months, and it’s totally wowed me. Think ice cream makers need to be huge and noisy? Think again. From my first use, the FastFreeze had me wondering why other brands make this frozen dessert business so intimidating. Surely it can’t be this easy?

Cuisinart FastFreeze review: Price and availability

(Image credit: Digitpatrox)

I tested Cuisinart’s FastFreeze ice cream maker, in the U.K., where it’s called the Freeze Wand. It’s the exact same product, retailing for around the £100 / $120 mark, which is significantly cheaper than alternatives from the likes of Ninja, which can set you back closer to £250 / $300.

You can find the FastFreeze direct from Cuisinart, and from Amazon. You can also buy extra dessert cups: $20 for two, which isn’t terrible.

In the U.K., where it’s called the Freeze Wand, it’s available at Cuisinart for £99, as well as Amazon. At time of writing, it’s a whopping £40 off at Amazon, down to just £59. That’s an absolutely bargain price.

Cuisinart FastFreeze review: Performance

I don’t love the white finish of this ice cream maker. It looks a little cheap and plasticky, which isn’t what you want from a gadget that houses a spinning blade. But to use, it feels reassuringly sturdy. Plus, since I first tested it, Cuisinart has released a bunch of fun colors, such as purple and green.

Its containers are high-quality, with colored lids that allow you to identify different frozen mixes — a surprisingly tricky task when 99% of the desserts you make look like grey sludge when frozen.

To use, you need to take your frozen container and attach it to a housing unit, which contains the blade that will spin and churn your mixture into a creamy consistency. Once attached, you insert the plunging wand, which (reassuringly) won’t lock into place unless the dessert cup is attached. So in case you were wondering if you could accidentally be left holding a spinning blade on a wand, the answer is no.

Once locked into place, you can choose from five settings on your wand: ice cream, slushie, milkshake, sorbet, and mix-ins. To be honest, I’m not sure how differently these settings actually work. If they change the speed at which the blade spins, I didn’t notice it.

I love that the dessert cups are the ideal size for a single serving of ice cream. They’re a half pint each, which roughly fits most pre-mixed protein shakes or pudding cups.

For comparison, the Ninja Creami containers start at a pint size, 16 oz, and deluxe sizes are 24 oz. This is great for serving two or more people, but I can attest that it demands a lot of freezer space, especially if you want to experiment with different bases. By comparison, the FastFreeze took up very little room in my freezer.

The first dessert I made in the FastFreeze was a low-cal protein shake. This is something for which people adore the Ninja Creami: you can take a simple protein shake and turn it into a pint of ice cream, with all the low-calorie and high-protein benefits. I opted for a chocolate shake, adding a bit more sweetener before freezing. As an aside, freezing things makes them taste less sweet, so you often need to tweak your recipes to enhance the flavor.

After freezing for a full 24 hours and letting my cup sit out and soften for about 15 minutes, I then switched on the FastFreeze to the ice cream setting. I’ve read other publications’ reviews, which said the churning process took them up to 15 minutes. I’m not sure what machine they were testing, but every setting I used with this machine was finished in well under a minute. This was no exception: you press the play button, which then turns a light on the front of the machine green, and then you gently press down on the top of the wand.

It requires very minimal effort, and once you get to the bottom of the cup the light turns red, and you can start to raise the wand back up. I found that it was best to repeat this a couple of times to get the creamiest results.

Is it noisy? Yeah. But if you’ve used the Ninja Creami, which gives new meaning to the word noisy, the Cuisinart will make you feel like you’re at a spa. It hit 82dB when churning, equivalent to a hair dryer, and slightly less noisy than most blenders. So if you’re worried about annoying your neighbors, you should be ok with the FastFreeze.

My protein dessert tasted good. Not “OMG this tastes like Ben and Jerry’s” good, but “wow this frozen protein shake is surprisingly tasty” good. As with any ice cream maker, you’ll always get the best results with a high-fat mixture, as this is pivotal in creating the creaminess you expect from real ice cream. As a result, the protein shake was a little grainy. But still nice, and just as good as the protein recipes I’ve made in my Creami.

I also made frozen yogurt in the Freeze Wand. I decided it was best to use the sorbet setting with this. Given the low fat content, I was curious to see if I’d get less grainy results with a different setting. As I said earlier, I don’t think there’s much of a difference between the settings, but the frozen yogurt still came out great.

I had added raspberries before freezing, and it created a raspberry ripple effect that looked delicious. Be warned though, what tastes sweet enough before freezing won’t taste the same frozen. The raspberries tasted pretty sour, so I drizzled in some milk and syrup and used the ‘Mix In’ setting to integrate everything.

Obviously, the ultimate test of any ice cream maker is how well it can make actual, full-fat ice cream. And wow, can this this make tasty ice cream. I decided to make some vanilla ice cream to accompany a dessert for a dinner party, and followed Cuisinart’s recipe for classic vanilla ice cream. This involved mixing cream, milk, vanilla, salt, and sugar and whisking before freezing. It couldn’t have been easier to do, and I was able to make enough mixture to fill up all three cups in minutes.

Churning the three containers was done in under five minutes, after which point I attempted to serve a scoop for me and five of my colleagues. This was tricky, because the FastFreeze really isn’t designed to create batches. Those half-pint cups are not conducive to making quenelles, and the thin layer of more grainy mixture which sticks to the inside of the container could easily get in the way while you’re scooping. But I’m hardly a master chef, and all I cared about was that it tasted great, which it did.

My guests loved the ice cream. In fact, one couple enjoyed it so much that they said they wanted to buy a FastFreeze for themselves.

How does it compare?

There’s only one comparison which matters: should you buy the Ninja Creami or the Cuisinart FastFreeze? As a certified Creami-lover, I can heartily recommend both products. But the answer depends on what you’re looking for.

Personally, I’d buy the Cuisinart. It’s significantly cheaper, a lot smaller (about the size of an immersion blender), and ideal for single servings, which is what I typically make with my Creami anyway. Those cups are a lot easier to fit into the freezer. Plus, it’s less noisy, and takes less time than the Creami.

But, if you do want to make ice cream for two or more people, the Creami has the obvious benefit of those larger cups. Plus, it’s totally hands-free, which could be appealing to those who either struggle with mobility or who like the idea of leaving the machine to do all the work for them.

And if you buy the Creami Swirl, Ninja’s latest release, it can make soft-serve ice cream. Which is something you’ll never be able to achieve with the FastFreeze.

Should you buy the Cuisinart FastFreeze?

If you’re considering investing in a frozen treat maker, there are so many reasons why it should be the Cuisinart FastFreeze. It’s (comparatively) quiet, it’s so easy to use and it’s also pretty affordable. As someone who has their pick of a number of ice cream makers, the FastFreeze is the one I think I’d keep in my small kitchen.

I honestly think the FastFreeze deserves more hype. It’s so much more than a dupe; it completely reinvents the frozen dessert game. The only people I wouldn’t recommend it to are those who want to create large servings, as those half-pint cups are best suited to single servings.