Savor Every Scoop: A Delightful Review of the Ninja Swirl Soft Serve Machine

Choosing what to whip up can be quite daunting (especially when you’re just 7 years old), so allow me to share a few tips. It’s not a blender, so don’t expect it to chop through hard, loose ingredients like ice cubes or frozen berries directly. In our excitement, we’ve even tossed large amounts of soft, fresh ingredients into the ice cream as mix-ins, which can compromise the soft serve’s texture, rendering it a bit crumbly and less uniform, though my family claims they enjoy it just the same.

As a rule of thumb, avoid trying to cheat by spinning pints that aren’t completely frozen, as this will result in an uneven texture. Smaller bits tend to get shredded while larger components, like chocolate chips, remain intact. However, if you misjudge the texture, you can easily correct it by hitting the Re-Spin button to achieve a smoother result.

Enjoy the Process

The classic tart yogurt has been a standout success for me—I can hardly believe how closely it resembles the offerings at Pinkberry. Alongside, we crafted chocolate and vanilla soft serve, both the advanced and basic recipes, and even blended up some milkshakes.

I took the time to play around with different varieties of Dole Whip. Ninja has its own cleverly unbranded variant called Tropical Fruit Whip, which closely mirrors what we experienced in Hawaii; my husband also relished a roughly approximated version of a recipe from Epicurious. The Fruit Whip setting produced a much lighter, airier texture compared to the frozen yogurt or soft serve options. Generally, if you stick to the recipes included in the booklet, Ninja’s recipes tend to lean towards the sweeter side. Frozen bananas and pineapple are sweet enough on their own without the added honey.

Ninja also boasts a range of diet-specific recipes, aptly termed CreamiFit recipes. These incorporate substitutes such as protein powder and unsweetened almond milk in place of whole milk, or agave syrup instead of granulated sugar. The creative uses of these recipes helped propel the Creami into internet stardom a few years back. Within Ninja’s booklet, if not online, the CreamiFit recipes feature more complex flavors that might leave you scratching your head about whether it’s the specific brand of pistachio pudding mix that tastes subpar, or if it’s truly the recipe that’s lacking.

My take on these recipes might be irrelevant, given that telling someone that their diet ice cream doesn’t taste like traditional ice cream is akin to informing a long-time vegan that seitan satay bears no resemblance to meat. They’re simply not going to accept it, nor do they particularly care. Thus, here we stand—these recipes are a reality, and they do work. However, I do feel compelled to mention that if this is your route, freezing standard flavored yogurt offers the same nutritional value and is more cost-effective and straightforward.

What truly makes the Swirl enjoyable isn’t the pursuit of replicating flawless recipes, but rather the spontaneous culinary experiments happening on a Tuesday night when I’ve depleted all the ingredients initially bought to test this gadget and my sugar-energized children are racing through the house.

Chocolate milk? Absolutely. Lemonade sorbet? Why not! Each evening, my children remind me to ensure that there’s something ready in the freezer for them to try out the next day after dinner. Just imagine, hypothetically, forgetting to freeze any ice cream before a sleepover with a 10-year-old. A quick trip to the store for vanilla, waffle cones, and toppings turned out to be a hit. There’s just something about a soft-serve machine that transforms almost any item into a delightful treat.

Over several weeks, most of the errors I’ve encountered with the Swirl have stemmed from user mistakes—such as believing that freezing it for less than the full 24 hours is acceptable or drastically misjudging my child’s craving for salty ice cream. Today, as we drove past the nearest frozen yogurt shop—a 20-minute drive we rarely make as we prefer biking or walking—I felt elated at the prospect of recreating its sweet delights at home. For that reason alone, the Ninja Swirl has been the most enjoyable thing I’ve tested in months.