Ice Cream Maker Ball

More of a product review here than a craft project. But I would consider it to be a creative activity!

I have always wanted one of these ice cream making balls since I saw them a few years ago. But the lowest the price ever went was $30 and I was not excited about spending $30 on something that didn't work, or didn't make good ice cream. I mean $30 is a couple trips to Dairy Queen after all.

But I lucked out finally! I am an avid thrift shopper and when something is on my list I usually just wait for it to show up at a thrift store. I waited over two years, but one finally did! I spotted this one for $5 at Savers. I can totally handle $5.

So the basic recipe is one pint half and half, one and a half tsp vanilla and 1/3 cup of sugar.

We tossed in half a broken Hershey bar this time.

You dump that in one end...

And the ice and rock salt in the opposite end and twist on the lids.

Then you go play with it. My kids lugged it with them while they played in the sprinkler. The we opened it and scrapped down the sides.

Next sat and rolled it to each other for a while. But when that got too boring. They came up with this idea.

If I was thinking, I would have had them count how many times they rolled it down the slide to let you know how many times it would take to make ice cream, but I didn't think of that until after they were done.

Our ball came with two little levers to open it. I don't know if it was supposed to come with two, or just one, I also think that a scrapper of some sort would have been helpful, but we just used a plastic spoon we had.

Here is our ice cream!

The kids got a kick out of how ice cream is made, but I think my 4 year old might now assume that they are kicking ice cream making balls around in the kitchen at Dairy Queen.

It turned out pretty good. This was actually our second batch. Our first we just did plain vanilla and I think I liked eating that better. With the chocolate chunks you want to chew it and the ice crystals are a bit cold when you chew them. But with no chocolate chunks it was yummy to let it melt by smooshing it with your tongue.

Fun? Yep

Easy? Sure

Am I glad I have one? Yep

Is it as good as Dairy Queen? No, but the process is the fun part and we still enjoyed the ice cream.

Would I pay full price? Nah, but I never pay full price for anything.

It took a while. About 45 min of ball play to make the ice cream you see above. But.. it kept them busy for 45 minutes, 4 and 6 year old worked together for the common goal of ice cream. They understood that if they didn't play with it, they didn't get to eat the ice cream.
Thanks to the story of Little Red Hen.

You can find a ball like this on Amazon pretty easy, also found them online at Target and Walmart after a quick search.

Linking up here: