How to Choose the Best Soft Serve Ice Cream Machine for Your Needs!

Commercial ice cream machines are classified into two types: soft serve and batch freezers. Which unit you add to your commercial kitchen will depend on the type of confection you want to make and the quantity you need to generate. Read on to find out which type is the best for your business.

At a glance, here's how each sort of ice cream machine works:

Soft Serve Machine Features

Soft serve ice cream machines often generate light and airy ice cream with a soft texture, hence the name "soft serve," and allow operators to dispense on-demand cones and cups with the pull of a lever, which can also aid with amount control. Soft serve machines can also be used to dispense other delights such as frozen yogurt, which lends a light, soft feel to other confections.

Soft-serve machines are available in a variety of flavors, capacities (countertop or floor versions), feed mechanisms (gravity or pressure), and cooling systems (air-cooled or water-cooled).

Soft Serve Ice Cream Machine Types

For soft-serve machines, there are two types of feed systems: gravity-fed and pressure-fed. These functions describe how the liquid mix is supplied from the hopper into your machine's freezing cylinder.

Gravity-Fed Soft Serve Machines

Gravity-fed machines depend on gravity to feed a predetermined air ratio mix into the freezing cylinder. Because gravity-fed soft serve machines produce less ice cream overrun, the product would be denser and more delicious than when produced by pressure-fed soft serve machines.

Advantages:

• More reasonably priced
• Simpler to clean
• Easier to maintain because when compared to pressure-fed machines, there are fewer moving components.

Disadvantages:

• Reduced overrun yield
• Soft serve is not as silky and creamy

Model Featured: Spaceman 6235-C 2 Flavors Countertop Gravity Fed Soft-Serve Machine

Pressure-Fed Soft Serve Machines

Pressure-fed, or pump-fed, machines include a hopper pump that feeds the mix into the freezing cylinder, allowing operators to manage the quantity of air supplied to the mix. Because pressure-fed soft serve machines produce more overrun, they would produce softer and creamier soft serve than the ones by gravity-fed soft serve machines.

Advantages:

• Overrun yield is higher and better controlled for a higher-quality product.
• For consistency, it aids in maintaining constant pressure in the freezing cylinder.
• Ideal for high-volume manufacturing

Disadvantages:

• Greater cost
• Cleaning and upkeep are more demanding.

Model Featured: Spaceman 6378A-C 2 Flavors

Heat Treatment Soft Serve Machines

Heat treatment, pressure-fed soft serve machines have a heating and cooling cycle that safely keeps dairy products for up to two weeks before disassembling and cleaning. Heat treatment freezers further minimize labor while also addressing food safety, product waste, maintenance, and repair costs.

Model Featured: Icetro ISI-161TI

Commercial Ice Cream Machines: Gravity vs. Pressure-Fed

A gravity ice cream machine differs from a pressure-fed soft serve machine. The former employs gravity to convey the soft serve mix into the freezing cylinder, whereas pressure-fed machines use a pump.

Pressurized devices are commonly utilized in environments that need a high-volume output and while gravity soft-serve machines are less expensive, easier to operate, and require less maintenance than pressure-fed units.

Floor Models vs. Countertop Machines

You can choose a countertop or floor-standing business machine based on the volume of products you want to sell. It also comes down to the amount of space available.

Countertop machines are often chosen restaurant equipment for businesses that plan on serving a limited number of people at a time. Such examples are events that only open on weekends, or for those with limited space.

Floor model machines have a bigger output capacity and may be more suited to an ice cream shop or dessert shop.

Types of Condenser

Benefits of Water Cooled Soft Serve Ice Cream Machines

Water-cooled soft-serve machines use water to cool the condenser, allowing the refrigerant to cool it down as efficiently as possible. If you have a high-volume business, more than one soft serve machine in a single location, or a small space where heat output from an air-cooled machine could be a concern, we recommend a water-cooled soft serve machine.

• If your soft serve machine will be used outdoors in heated circumstances, such as a pool deck, it must be water-cooled.
• Removes heat from the area around the machine and into the room.
• Cools ice cream as quickly as possible for a consistent, food-safe product.
• The process is less noisy, resulting in a more soothing consumer experience.

Benefits of Air Cooled Soft Serve Ice Cream Machines

A soft serve machine that is air-cooled works by forcing heat away from the machine so that the refrigerant can recirculate and keep the product cold. You'll need plenty of room around the machine for the heat to escape.

• Ice cream stays frozen and ready to serve in an instant.
• There is no need for a water supply pipe or a drain.
• Machine location and mobility are both convenient.
• Installation is simple; no plumbing is required.

Commercial Ice Cream Machines: Air Cooled vs. Water Cooled

Because they do not require a constant water supply, air-cooled machines are more adjustable in terms of location but because they rely on a vent system to remove heat from the machine and bring in cool air from outside, the vents must always be clear.

Commercial ice cream makers that are water-cooled. They circulate cold water through their internal components. As a result, when high-volume output is required, water-cooled solutions are excellent. This is despite the fact that they almost always necessitate a constant water supply and the installation of a drain.

Ice Cream Machine Special Features

Many machines include a variety of extra features that increase the quality of your hard and soft-serve ice cream while also making the production process easier.

Hopper Accelerator

A hopper agitator, which is available as an option on some high-end machines, slowly stirs the product in the hopper to improve product consistency and prevent product separation. Although the substance must still be blended before being poured into the hopper, the agitator eliminates the need to manually agitate the product throughout the day.

Pasteurizer

A batch freezer with a pasteurizer is essential for creating homemade ice cream because it ensures the mix reaches a temperature that kills any hazardous bacteria and is safe to eat. Many batch freezers include a 2-in-1 configuration in which the mixture is heated and pasteurized in one cylinder and then frozen in another.

Air Pump

During dispensing, an air pump injects air into the ice cream to increase overrun. Aside from producing a lighter, creamier product, the air pump enables you to use less ice cream mix while providing more cones, so saving money.

What is Overrun?

Overrun is a significant factor in both ice cream manufacturing and the decision-making process for which unit to use. It is the quantity of air added to the ice cream mixture during the manufacturing process, and it is frequently expressed as a percentage.

To make good ice cream, gelato, frozen yogurt, and other sweet treats, your ice cream machine must produce a certain amount of overrun; as previously discussed, different types of commercial ice cream makers will add different amounts of overrun depending on the type of frozen dessert you're attempting to make.

This scenario will help you picture it more: If you make one gallon of soft serve ice cream with a 30% overrun, it means that 30% of the ice cream was combined into liquid form during production. As a result, you'll end up with 1.30 gallons of frozen soft serve. The bigger the overrun, the higher the product yield.