BilanciaLi Gold – Advanced balance for homemade ice cream

Description

Current version: 3.0.2
Last update: 12.05.2026

BilanciaLi Gold is designed for those who want maximum technical control over their ice cream.

It is not just a file for checking sugars, fats, solids, AFP, and SP. It is a complete working tool for those who want to design recipes more precisely, save them, edit them, print them, calculate their cost, manage semi-finished products, and better understand how a mixture really behaves as temperature changes.

It is the version best suited for workshops, restaurants, industry professionals, and very advanced homemakers who want to do more than just “get it right” with ice cream; they want to understand why it works, how to correct it, and how to make it more stable, more serviceable, and more consistent with the desired result.

What changes with BilanciaLi Gold 3.0

With version 3.0, BilanciaLi Gold introduces some of the most advanced ice cream balancing features in the BilanciaLi range.

Multilingual Version (Italian + English)

When you buy the product, you directly find two versions, one in Italian and one in English. You choose which one to use.

Freezing curve

The freezing curve is one of the most important functions of BilanciaLi Gold 3.0.

It allows you to graphically see how the free water in your mixture behaves as the temperature drops. This is critical because the consistency of the ice cream depends not only on the total AFP, but on how the mixture behaves during freezing and serving.

The curve helps you to think more concretely about very practical questions: at what temperature will the ice cream be serviceable? When will it be too hard? When will it start to get too soft? What happens if I change the sugars or other solids?

This is an especially useful feature for those working in laboratories, restaurants, or with gourmet ice cream, where serving temperature can make the difference between a proper product and one that is difficult to handle.

Advanced calculation of serving temperature

BilanciaLi Gold calculates the serving temperature of the recipe from the behavior of the mixture. This is a useful function for those working with showcase, sump, professional freezer, Pacojet or plate service. Each context has different needs, and Gold helps you design the recipe according to the end result.

OQP – Optimal Quenelle Point

OQP, Optimal Quenelle Point, is an exclusive function of BilanciaLi Gold.

It is used to identify the temperature at which the ice cream reaches an ideal consistency to form a quenelle: soft enough to be worked with a spoon, but still textured enough to maintain shape, edge and stability in the dish.

It is a function designed primarily for food service, plated pastry, and gourmet ice cream, but it is also useful for those who want to better understand the relationship between temperature, texture, and service.

Instead of waiting for “the right time” by eye, you can work with a numerical reference and use the freezing curve to arrive at a more precise management.

Sandiness Index

The sandiness index helps keep one of the most annoying problems with ice cream under control: the possible crystallization of lactose.

When a recipe contains too much lactose relative to the overall balance of the mixture, the ice cream can develop a sandy sensation on the palate. BilanciaLi Gold alerts you to this risk and helps you take action before you get to the finished product. This is a very useful feature when you are working with powdered milk, very rich recipes, or particularly thick bases.

Food cost

BilanciaLi Gold allows you to manage the food cost of recipes. You can set the currency, enter the cost per kg of ingredients, and get the cost of the mixture, recipe, and different weighings in print.

This is an essential function for workshops, restaurants, and professionals, but also useful for those who want to really understand how much it costs to produce a particular ice cream, especially when working with expensive ingredients, nuts, chocolate, pure pastes, or artisanal semi-finished products.

Over 200 recipes included to get you started right away

BilanciaLi Gold already includes an archive of recipes organized by profile: ice cream, sorbet, granita, vegan ice cream, gastronomic ice cream, gastronomic sorbet, and Pacojet/Ninja.

You can use them as a starting point, edit them, recalculate them, and save new versions directly to the file. This way you don’t start with a blank screen, but with concrete examples that help you better understand how balancing works.

Print recipes

The print function generates a compact and neat recipe sheet. You can view ingredients in multiple configurable weighings, main recipe values, food cost, notes, and essential technical information.

It is designed to have a clear recipe to use in the lab, share with collaborators, archive or consult during production without having to work directly on the main balancer screen.

Management of semi-finished products

Gold allows you to create and save recipes as “semi-finished product”, then treat them as individual ingredients in subsequent recipes.

This function is very useful when you are working with complex preparations: a sauce, a gourmet base, a craft dough, a cooked mixture, a savory preparation, or any item made up of multiple ingredients. Instead of having to re-enter all the components each time, you can balance the semi-finished product once, save it, and then use it as a single ingredient.

For gourmet ice cream and catering, this is a very powerful function.

Saving and managing recipes without fixed limit

BilanciaLi Gold allows you to save and manage your recipes directly in the file. You can create new recipes, update them, rename them, move them from one profile to another, delete them, and recall them whenever you want.

Management is not limited to a fixed number of recipes, so you can build up a very large personal archive over time: bases, sorbets, slushies, gourmet ice creams, alcoholic ice creams, Pacojet recipes, semi-finished products, and development trials.

12 configurable profiles

BilanciaLi Gold includes 12 configurable profiles. You can work on ice cream, sorbet, slush, vegan ice cream, gourmet ice cream, gourmet sorbet, fried ice cream, semi-finished products, and customizable profiles.

Each profile can have its own parameters: sugars, fats, NFMS, other solids, total solids, SP, AFP, neutrals, alcohols, fruits, chopped foods, and other reference values.

Customizable profiles can also be reconfigured to work on nonstandard preparations, such as parfaits, Ninja Creami bases, variegates, frozen desserts, or other structures you want to develop. Of course you need to set parameters that make sense for the product you want to achieve, but that’s the logic: adapt the balancer to the way you work.

The limitation, more than the file, is your imagination.

Data migration

BilanciaLi Gold includes a data migration system designed to take you from one version to the next. Starting with version 2.0 you can migrate recipes, ingredients, and configurations from previous compatible versions, avoiding the need to rebuild everything from scratch with each upgrade.

This is a very important function if you use BilanciaLi as a working tool and have built up your archive of recipes, ingredients and parameters over time.

Please note: since version 3.0 we have improved the accuracy of AFP and SP of dairy foods. When you migrate your data from version 2.0 two columns (AFP and SP) are added to the food table for dairy products. The automatic calculation is the same as the versions up to 2.0 did, but it is an approximation and for lactose-free products the values definitely need to be corrected. A once-in-a-lifetime job, but one that will improve the accuracy of your ice creams.

Minima and maxima for each ingredient

Each ingredient can have a minimum and maximum percentage. This function allows much more precise control of the recipe, because it is not enough for the ice cream to be balanced in the overall parameters: the use of individual ingredients must also make sense.

You can set limits for cream, milk powder, neutrals, sugars, main ingredients, pastes, alcohol, or any item on your ingredient list.

It is a function that helps you build recipes that are technically correct, but also realistic and reproducible.

Ingredients divided by category and extensible list

Ingredients are organized into categories:

• dairy products and eggs
• neutrals and bases
• sugars
• main ingredients
• fruits and vegetables
• spirits
• chopped food
• semi-finished products

The ingredient list is extensible and editable, so you can add your own ingredients, update technical values, insert costs, and adapt the file to the products you actually use.

Balancing sugars, fats, solids, SLNG, PODs and PACs.

BilanciaLi Gold monitors key mixture parameters: sugars, fat, total solids, SLNG, other solids, POD and PAC.

These values allow you to see if the recipe is consistent with the selected profile and where to intervene if something is not right.

The difference, in Gold, is that these data do not stand in isolation: they dialogue with more advanced functions such as serving temperature, freezing curve, sandiness index, food cost, and semi-finished products.

Balancing of neutrals, bases, alcohols and chopped foods

Gold also allows you to manage more specific recipe components. You can control the dosage of neutrals, insert bases, calculate the impact of alcohols on PAC, and manage chopped foods or inclusions without altering parameters that should not be changed.

This part becomes especially important when working with gourmet ice creams, alcoholic recipes, complex pastries, dried fruits or inclusions.

Weight recalculation while maintaining balance

Have you developed a 1 kg recipe but want to produce 2 kg, 5 kg or 10 kg? With the recalculation function you can adjust the weight of the recipe while maintaining the set balance.

It is a simple function, but essential when moving from rehearsal to production.

Indicative calculation of calories

BilanciaLi Gold also calculates the approximate calories in the recipe. It is not a substitute for a nutritional lab analysis, but it gives you a useful reference to better understand the product you are building.

CAP calculators

BilanciaLi Gold includes useful calculators for estimating the PAC of particular ingredients or preparations. They are useful when working with sugars, fatty pastes, chocolates, semi-finished products, or ingredients not yet in the table.

This way you can add new ingredients more consciously and gradually expand your work system.

Video Demo

In the video below I will guide you to discover all the new features of our ice cream balancer, a tool that has now become indispensable for both professional ice cream makers and home enthusiasts alike. We will explore together the three new versions available (Gold, Studio and Basic) and I will show you in action the more advanced functions of the Excel balancer, such as the innovative Freezing Curve , calculation of the optimal quenching point and new precision management for PAC and POD of dairy and delactose products.. Make yourself comfortable and click Play to find out which version is right for you and how to migrate your old recipes in a matter of seconds!

To whom BilanciaLi Gold is suitable

BilanciaLi Gold is designed for those who want maximum control.

It is the version best suited for:

• craft workshops
• restaurants
• bakeries
• Chefs working with ice cream on the plate
• who develops gourmet ice cream
• who works with Pacojet
• very advanced housewares
• enthusiasts who want to really study the structure of ice cream

You don’t have to be a professional to use it, but Gold is at its best when used with technical curiosity and a desire to understand.

If you just want to get started, the BilanciaLi Basic version is more straightforward.
If you want to save recipes, experiment, and work with multiple profiles, the BilanciaLi Studio version is probably sufficient.
If, on the other hand, you want freezing curve, OPQ, sandiness index, food cost, semi-finished products, printing, and data migration, then Gold is the right version.

Minimum Requirements

BilanciaLi is an Excel spreadsheet and requires no ‘installation.

Making use of “macros” and modern functions of Microsoft Excel requires that a recent version of Microsoft Office be installed on your computer.

• On Windows or Mac OS: Microsoft Office 2021 or newer versions

BilanciaLi is officially supported only by Microsoft Office (listed versions or newer) and will not work with Open Office, Google Docs, or other unlisted spreadsheet readers.

On tablets and smartphones the balancer is not fully functional because macros are not supported.

Free update period

Once the product is purchased, the user can access free updates for 1 year, should new versions come out (updates are not very frequent as the product is very stable).

Important Note: Upgrade is done by downloading the latest version available in the download section of the user area and overwriting the old version. The file remains available for one year, then disappears.

User’s Manual

The best way to understand how to use the software is to sign up for the free course on balancing, in which all the functions of balancing gold are shown in a practical way.

Find a written version of the manual from the support page.