Pacojet Competitor? The Ninja Creami

[blue_dolphin]

Hetty Lui McKinnon's book, Tenderheart, has a recipe for a no-churn Fennel and Black Pepper Ice Cream. It uses both fennel seeds and chopped fresh fennel which get blended with sweetened condensed milk, cream, ground black pepper and a little olive oil. It just gets frozen and scooped. I found my Blendtec did a good job on the fennel but I didn't care for the texture of the seed particles.  I could have put it through a sieve but decided to just freeze it in a Creami container and give it a spin to take care of those seedy bits and I thought it worked well. 

It's supposed to get a drizzle of olive oil but I forgot.  The flavors make for an appealing, almost palate-cleansing effect. 

[palo]

For an edited version of this recipe:

 

https://www.cuisine.co.nz/recipe/fennel-black-pepper-ice-cream/

 

p

[jedovaty]

Hi: I tried a couple more recipes from Salt and Straw book that was gifted to me: strawberry balsamic and black pepper, and strawberry sorbet.  For SBB, I swapped out the milk base for coconut base, and replaced honey with sugar.  It tasted like the strawberry push pops I had as a kid in the 1980s omg what a blast to the past!  The Strawberry Sorbet calls for cilantro/coriander essence/extract, which I have no clue what this is so I added a few twigs of natural organic fresh home grown urban raised evil sourced unfair wage [free labor] non-d.o.p. cilantro.  This was delicious.. a variation of strawberry with mint!

 

The book itself is poorly written.  They don't list all the ingredients in the ingredients side bar of each recipe, and they are inconsistent with when they include parts of a recipe or move it out into its own paragraph.  It's like we have to read and comprehend the recipe, can't just skim and know what to do.  Bah.

 

That said, results are tasty, and they all keep a soft-serve texture after undergoing the ninja treament, maybe from all the corn syrup.

 

No pictures, sorry, I just ate each straight out of the cream-i jar and it's ugly.  If you can use your imagination, SBB was light pink with streaks of jam, the other was dark pink, borderline maroon.

[fledflew]

The Ninja Creami Deluxe is on sale today at Kohls for $158 with free shipping - deal is good for today only (5/27/24).  Posted price is $230, then use TAKE10, HOME15, and CATCH15OFF on Kohls.com.  I'm super close to buying one at this price.  I'm going to think about it for a few hours and if it's not sold out when I check back, I'll pull the trigger on one.  I will also post this in the "sales., deals, and bargains" thread.  

[Kerry Beal]

On 5/27/2024 at 5:34 PM, fledflew said:

The Ninja Creami Deluxe is on sale today at Kohls for $158 with free shipping - deal is good for today only (5/27/24).  Posted price is $230, then use TAKE10, HOME15, and CATCH15OFF on Kohls.com.  I'm super close to buying one at this price.  I'm going to think about it for a few hours and if it's not sold out when I check back, I'll pull the trigger on one.  I will also post this in the "sales., deals, and bargains" thread.  

Did you buy it?

[ElsieD]

I recently bought some of this at Costco and we quite liked it.   It is in looks and tastes like DQ soft serve.  I churned it in my Breville.  Today I bought some more.  I'd like to use my Creami to churn it (not sure if that is the right word) so I plan to freeze 1/2 cup amounts in the Creami pints and take it for a spin.  Once I get the right spin, I'd like to start adding things such as fruit puree, caramel sauce, dulce de leche etc.  Any advice?  I'm thinking adding caramel sauce won't be a problem bur fruit purees could be. Any suggestions?

[fledflew]

On 5/28/2024 at 5:54 PM, Kerry Beal said:

Did you buy it?

I did end up buying one and it arrived about a week ago.  I unboxed it, washed everything, and then read through the entire 52 page thread here (I had only skimmed it before).  

Like many, my first attempt was the "can of fruit" sorbet - I went with pineapple.  I just spun it this morning for the first run and am very pleased after letting it temper to a slightly warmer serving temperature.  My only gripe is the 2-3mm of unprocessed product around the edge of the container that others have warned me of.  Ultimately, it's not a huge deal.  The pineapple sorbet was very refreshing after coming in from doing several hours of yardwork in the heat this morning.  

I must confess that I don't have huge sweet tooth and was hoping to use it for more savory applications, but from what I've gleaned from this thread is that frozen soups and stocks may pose a problem if the freezing point isn't lowered enough with the addition of a minimum amount of salt (or sugar).  I'll continue to experiment and discover the limits of the machine and will report any notable findings.  Although I'm not a huge dessert person, I do enjoy fruit-based treats, so I foresee a lot of sorbets in my future, probably some frozen drinks, and maybe some ice cream now and then for the neighborhood kids.  

[Kerry Beal]

4 hours ago, fledflew said:

I did end up buying one and it arrived about a week ago.  I unboxed it, washed everything, and then read through the entire 52 page thread here (I had only skimmed it before).  

Like many, my first attempt was the "can of fruit" sorbet - I went with pineapple.  I just spun it this morning for the first run and am very pleased after letting it temper to a slightly warmer serving temperature.  My only gripe is the 2-3mm of unprocessed product around the edge of the container that others have warned me of.  Ultimately, it's not a huge deal.  The pineapple sorbet was very refreshing after coming in from doing several hours of yardwork in the heat this morning.  

I must confess that I don't have huge sweet tooth and was hoping to use it for more savory applications, but from what I've gleaned from this thread is that frozen soups and stocks may pose a problem if the freezing point isn't lowered enough with the addition of a minimum amount of salt (or sugar).  I'll continue to experiment and discover the limits of the machine and will report any notable findings.  Although I'm not a huge dessert person, I do enjoy fruit-based treats, so I foresee a lot of sorbets in my future, probably some frozen drinks, and maybe some ice cream now and then for the neighborhood kids.  

Back when I was using the iCreami instead of the Pacojet I found running one of my bone handled knives around the edge after the first spin solved that problem. 

[fledflew]

On 6/9/2024 at 3:23 PM, Kerry Beal said:

Back when I was using the iCreami instead of the Pacojet I found running one of my bone handled knives around the edge after the first spin solved that problem. 

I was afraid of scratching the plastic, so I have been running a bit of water around the sides to soften them up.  I was initially hesitant to temper the sides because I thought the frozen block would just spin around once the blade contacted it, but the bottom of the creami containers has indents which the liquid base freezes into, creating "teeth" to hold the frozen block in place (and to keep the canister from spinning in its cartridge/holder).  I did thaw one a bit too much last week and the block started spinning when the blade hit it.  Still turned out fine because the movement of the frozen block couldn't keep up with the extremely high RPMs of the descending blade.  

[Kerry Beal]

4 hours ago, fledflew said:

I was afraid of scratching the plastic, so I have been running a bit of water around the sides to soften them up.  I was initially hesitant to temper the sides because I thought the frozen block would just spin around once the blade contacted it, but the bottom of the creami containers has indents which the liquid base freezes into, creating "teeth" to hold the frozen block in place (and to keep the canister from spinning in its cartridge/holder).  I did thaw one a bit too much last week and the block started spinning when the blade hit it.  Still turned out fine because the movement of the frozen block couldn't keep up with the extremely high RPMs of the descending blade.  

I freeze stuff in big yogurt containers - then put it in to the pacojet containers - so it's not fixed on the bottom - but it still seems to work fine. 

[ElsieD]

I tried blackberry ice cream and mango ice cream.  Both were delicious, though I had to re-spin both before it was scoopable.  I've also made strawberry using fresh strawberries which I pureed and strained to get rid of the seeds.  That one got a gold star.

[Smithy]

1 hour ago, ElsieD said:

I tried blackberry ice cream and mango ice cream.  Both were delicious, though I had to re-spin both before it was scoopable.  I've also made strawberry using fresh strawberries which I pureed and strained to get rid of the seeds.  That one got a gold star.

 

They certainly look good. Did you have ingredients aside from the pureed fruit? Dairy, for instance? I haven't put my CreamI back in action yet but may get around to it this summer.

[ElsieD]

13 hours ago, Smithy said:

 

They certainly look good. Did you have ingredients aside from the pureed fruit? Dairy, for instance? I haven't put my CreamI back in action yet but may get around to it this summer.

 

In the case of the mango and blackberry, i use frozen puree sweetened to taste then mix equal measures of the Vanilla Ice Cream Mix (picture above) and the pureed fruit.  I also added about 2 tablespoons of white (light?) corn syrup.  That's it - freeze and spin. 

[palo]

CNN's take on the Creami, a little fluffy but here it is:

https://www.cnn.com/cnn-underscored/reviews/ninja-creami

 

p

 

[Amy D.]

Have just got one for my birthday, and have a tin of pineapple and a nutella mix cooling in the freezer.

 

Was just wondering if anyone has tried a cornflour gelato base. Or a greek yoghurt? 

[blue_dolphin]

12 minutes ago, Amy D. said:

Have just got one for my birthday, and have a tin of pineapple and a nutella mix cooling in the freezer.

 

Was just wondering if anyone has tried a cornflour gelato base. Or a greek yoghurt? 

Happy Birthday!  
I’ve made several recipes using Greek yogurt, mostly from the recipes in Dana Cree's book, Hello, My Name Is Ice Cream. 

[Amy D.]

Thank you @blue_dolphin have put that book on my wish list 😊 

[ElsieD]

I'm going to be making a mango yogurt, possibly tomorrow.  It'll be the first time I've tried yogurt.  I'll post the result.

[rotuts]

@ElsieD

 

Im sure you know this , but just incase:

 

Ive made various things w yogurt in the past.

 

generally went w low fat // non fat.

 

full fat was generally better in the end .

[ElsieD]

1 hour ago, Amy D. said:

Have just got one for my birthday, and have a tin of pineapple and a nutella mix cooling in the freezer.

 

Was just wondering if anyone has tried a cornflour gelato base. Or a greek yoghurt? 

 

Can you please tell me what the manual has to say about the top, bottom and full settings?  I'm particularly interested in the bottom and top ones.

[blue_dolphin]

28 minutes ago, ElsieD said:

 

Can you please tell me what the manual has to say about the top, bottom and full settings?  I'm particularly interested in the bottom and top ones.

For the Ninja Creami Deluxe, 11-in-1, it basically says this:

[Amy D.]

Ah sorry @ElsieD I should have been clearer - I have the original version not the delux. Still interested to see how you get on. 

 

While I know i'll end up doing lots of experimenting, its the superquick prep ideas that intrigue me most (I just dont have as much time to play around in the kitchen these days) . I know theres a recipe in perfect scoop thats just yoghurt, sugar and vanilla so was wondering if anyo e has tried something like this.

[blue_dolphin]

17 hours ago, Amy D. said:

Thank you @blue_dolphin have put that book on my wish list 😊 

 

4 hours ago, Amy D. said:

While I know i'll end up doing lots of experimenting, its the superquick prep ideas that intrigue me most (I just dont have as much time to play around in the kitchen these days) . I know theres a recipe in perfect scoop thats just yoghurt, sugar and vanilla so was wondering if anyo e has tried something like this.

 

The Dana Cree book, Hello, My Name Is Ice Cream is really an excellent one for learning about ice cream and she uses interesting flavors.  While I wouldn't say the recipes are particularly time consuming, it's not a book of "superquick prep ideas," either so I don't want you to be disappointed. 

To give you an idea, her "Blank Slate Frozen Yogurt" that you can adapt with your own flavors, contains Greek yogurt, cream, milk or water, sugar, glucose and a texture agent of your choice (commercial stabilizer, guar or xanthan gum, tapioca starch or cornflour) and she adds the step of warming the dairy and sweeteners (you definitely want that heating step with cornflour or tapioca starch and some commercial stabilizers), before cooling and mixing in the yogurt.  She strains the mixture through a sieve at this point, but that's not necessary for the Creami.

 

One of the recipes in the book uses that Blank Slate Frozen Yogurt and mixes in chopped Amarena cherries and chocolate chunks so I'm going to try that one next!

 

 

 

[Amy D.]

Thank you @blue_dolphin probably beyond my time contraints at the moment then. 

 

I did the tinned pineapple sorbet which was lovely.

However when spinning a quick nutella one from the book I noticed that was shreading the desert tub. Very frustrating as made sure it was flat and put everything together correctly. Have emailed ninja but got reply that I need to phone them when they open tomorrow. I tried respinning the  pineapple again after and checked that tub which was fine.

 

 

[blue_dolphin]

1 minute ago, Amy D. said:

Thank you @blue_dolphin probably beyond my time contraints at the moment then. 

 

I did the tinned pineapple sorbet which was lovely.

However when spinning a quick nutella one from the book I noticed that was shreading the desert tub. Very frustrating as made sure it was flat and put everything together correctly. Have emailed ninja but got reply that I need to phone them when they open tomorrow. I tried respinning the  pineapple again after and checked that tub which was fine.

 

 

Contact their customer support. Since yours is new, it should be within warranty and they have been offering to replace the units in those cases.