Review: The Cuisinart Pure Indulgence Ice Cream Maker Is Great for Making Big Batches Quickly

Memorial Day has past, and seemingly overnight, ice cream has become a top priority for me. It’s important to make sure I have a good ice cream machine at home for when I’m between parlor visits. So I’ve set out to test non-commercial ice cream machines so we can all have a better summer than ever before. I decided to start with the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence Ice Cream Maker; overall, it’s a decent value for the amount of ice cream you can make in it.

When I’m testing out an ice cream machine, I look for a few basic things. I want to know how easy the machine is to operate, how fast it works, and how creamy the finished product turns out to be. From there, it’s a matter of price in relation to the quality of the ice cream. With the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence Ice Cream Maker, you get a reliable machine that churns out a maximum of two heaping quarts of ice cream for a reasonable price.

Types of ice cream machines

For context, there are two types of ice cream machines: compressor machines and canister ice cream makers—or as I call them, frozen bowl machines. This is based on how they cool the mixture you put inside. Compressor machines have a built-in refrigeration system, and you’ll see larger ones for industrial use. The ice cream base you put inside of the vessel gets churned and cools as it moves over the cold surface. The temperature is regulated by the machine, and you don’t have to pre-cool anything. These at-home models usually run at a higher price, around $300 to $600. 

Frozen bowl machines are much cheaper (some as cheap as $20), but they require that the user freezes the bowl first. It’s not just any bowl, by the way; it’s usually a special vessel that has a saline solution within the walls that will freeze the ice cream base later. The bowl gets as cold as possible and then the ice cream mixture is poured into this cold bowl. This type of machine simply rotates the dasher or blade in the bowl as the mixture freezes onto the walls of the bowl. The dasher scrapes the frozen crystals off the walls and they mix in while more of the mixture comes into contact with the walls and freezes. The Cuisinart Pure Indulgence Ice Cream Maker is a frozen bowl machine. 

What makes this ice cream machine stand out

I liked the dead-simple operation of this machine. There aren’t any digital screens, presets to scroll through, or kitschy little decorations on this machine. Instead, you get a simple, straightforward interface and a sleek silvery design. I also love that this machine can churn up to two quarts of ice cream. Many other at-home ice cream machines do a single pint up to one and a half quarts, so you can create bigger batches in the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence, and churn less often. 

How to use the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence

1. Freeze the bowl

When you set out to use the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence Ice Cream Machine—or any frozen bowl model of ice cream machine—you need to put the bowl in the freezer. Now. Well, maybe yesterday. It can take a good 24 hours to freeze the liquid inside of the special bowl so you have to plan well in advance of your next ice cream craving. 

2. Make the base mixture

You can use the recipe booklet that comes with the machine to make ice cream, frozen yogurt, sorbet, or gelato and feel confident that the resulting frozen treat will work out well and taste great. You can also use any recipe that you find online for the same types of treats, just take care that the Cuisinart’s vessel is only equipped to make a maximum batch of two quarts. Cool this mixture in the fridge until your bowl is ready.

3. Churn

The mixture is still softer than soft serve but it’s ready for the deep freeze.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

Plug in the machine. Put the frozen bowl into the machine (you’ll know it’s frozen if you don’t hear any splashing liquid inside when you shake it), add the dasher blade so the circle is facing the ceiling, place the lid on, and turn it to lock it. Turn the rotation switch to “on.” Pour the ice cream base in through the hole in the lid; the base will become thick and look like very soft soft serve after 15 to 25 minutes. 

4. Freeze further, if desired

The ice cream can be eaten in this soft-serve state but it’s a little too soft sometimes. If you want it to scoop like hard ice cream from the pint, pour it into a container that you pre-cooled in the freezer. Pop this into the freezer for another two hours or so. Be sure to cover it tightly for longterm freezing. 

The pros of the Pure Indulgence

I mentioned how easy it is to use the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence, and that really is fantastic. All you need to be sure of is that you like the recipe you’re using, but the machine itself won’t bring you any extra challenges.

Beyond that, the two-quart capacity is great for ice cream fans who know what they like and don’t want to churn a new batch every day. The machine has a sleek aesthetic, so if you decide to give it a permanent spot on the countertop, it’s not throwing off your decor. And possibly the most important plus of the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence is speed. I made a frozen yogurt in this machine that froze to soft-serve consistency after 12 minutes. I let it go for 15 and it was almost too frozen on the edges. For a larger capacity ice cream machine that hovers around the $100 to $120 price point, this is a solid purchase that will reward you all summer. 

The downsides of the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence

Let me start by saying that the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence makes good ice cream. There is nothing lacking in the mechanism, and the frozen bowl technology is effective and widely used by multiple brands. However, I found that when I made a frozen yogurt and a sorbet, two desserts that don’t have as much fat in them, the mixture’s consistency ranged from creamy to brittle after the vessel churned it.

Part of the frozen yogurt mixture was creamy and soft serve-like, and the rest got too cold. I had to carve it off the walls of the freezer vessel.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

That’s largely due to how the mixture freezes against the bowl and doesn’t mix into the rest of the base fast enough to keep the consistency even. This could be remedied with a faster churn or making the temperature a little warmer. But there is no speed or temperature control on the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence, so it doesn’t matter if the ideal temperature for freezing your dessert is -15°C, you just have to deal with what you get from your freezer bowl. Again, that’s the nature of freezer bowl units versus ice cream machines with compressors.

Big freezer bowls need time and space

Speaking of the freezer bowl—I personally find it inconvenient to store this relatively large vessel in the freezer for 24 hours. It takes up a lot of space, and you can’t really tell how long it will take to freeze completely. The time can vary if you’re opening and closing the freezer a lot or if it’s situated in the back or the front. 

When I was testing my first batch of frozen yogurt, I shook the bowl and it sounded silent (aka, ready to use). I put my base in and churned. The base started to thicken and I could see the icy side shavings, but after 20 minutes it did not continue thickening. I waited another 15 minutes and the mixture went back to its liquid state. Basically, the bowl wasn’t cold enough or my yogurt base wasn’t cold enough (or both) and the bowl ended up thawing before my base became chilled enough to freeze.

To make matters worse, you can’t freeze batches back to back. If you mess up like I did, the mixture has to be removed, the bowl has to be cleaned out, dried completely and then refrozen before your next attempt. Even if you do successfully get everything going, there’s no telling when your mixture is as frozen as it’s going to get. When I made vanilla bean ice cream, I had to call it after 25 minutes. The mixture was just slightly softer than I’d prefer, but I didn’t want to risk the bowl thawing and repeating my yogurt fiasco. So I dug it out of the bowl and popped it in the freezer. That executive decision is up to you. There’s no alert and no blinking light that will signal your mixture is done churning. 

Sadly, my biggest appliance pet peeve was also poked: The Cuisinart Pure Indulgence is kind of loud. It’s not as loud as a stand mixer on medium-high speed, but it’s louder than my refrigerator when it kicks on. It’s louder than I prefer for an ice cream machine, and there’s no real way to dampen it. Luckily, the ice cream inside freezes pretty fast so I didn’t have to listen to it for more than 25 minutes usually.

Is this the right ice cream maker for you?

The Cuisinart Pure Indulgence is a great ice cream machine for classic ice cream lovers who prefer big batches. While frozen yogurt and sorbet were kind of dense and icy from this machine, classic custard-based dairy ice creams were a creamy delight. If you see yourself making ice cream on a regular basis (say, once a week), make some room to keep the bowl in the freezer all the time. Then you’ll be ready for ice cream whenever the mood strikes. 

If you enjoy a variety of frozen desserts, not just dairy-based ice creams, then the Cuisinart Pure Indulgence might not be the first pick. Additionally, if you only like to make homemade frozen desserts occasionally or you prefer a variety of flavors available in your freezer at all times, then it’s probably better to opt for a different appliance.