juliebove
04-03-2006, 07:49 PM
I finally got one. Was waiting and waiting for the replacement one from Amazon.com, but due to some mixup, they are going to give me a refund instead. Takes 4-6 weeks to get a refund, I was told. Will never go this route again!
Bought one at Walmart. I checked it to make sure it had all the pieces and none were broken. It was just fine! Wish I had checked to see that it had an instruction manual. Because it did not. I've since learned that I can print one off online, so that's not a real biggie.
I was in a hurry to get some dinner ready before my daughter came home. Had not tried to look for the instruction manual online at that point. I really wanted chopped vegetables. Have since learned that in order to get a good even dice to them, you have to do a lot of prep work, so this probably is not something I would do anyway. Plus I couldn't figure out how to chop anythint without the manual, but I could figure out how to slice.
I put carrots in first. Normally I get big carrots in my organic produce box but there were none this week. All I had were baby carrots. Because they were small and the chute is large, they were sort of sliced at random. A few of them were sliced lengthwise. What I wound up with was sort of a chopped carroty mess. No problem really for what I was using them for. I have some big salad shears and I just used those to give a smaller chop to the few lengthwise pieces.
Next came the celery. Now I was in a hurry and I ripped the bottoms of the stalks off by hand, rather than taking the time to cut them off neatly. Perhaps this is why my slices didn't come out all nice and pretty. Some were oddly sliced and the rest were at an angle like you'd do for a Chinese Stir-Fry. Again, no problem for what I was doing today, but not what I'd normally want.
Next came the onions. The slices were very nice and uniform, but you need to remember to put the onion in with the bottom of it square. Otherwise you won't get those nice ring shapes. I used smallish onions and cut them in half because I hadn't figured out at that point that the chute was expandable. And since I really didn't want slices, I used the salad scissors on those as well. I probably should have shredded the onion for what I was doing tonight, but this worked just as well. I love onion and don't mind big pieces of it but my daughter will not eat something with big chunks of onion. If I cut it up small she doesn't notice. She likes the onion flavor. I think it's just the sight of the onion that's offputting to her. She likes slices of green onion though.
The last thing I put in were some baby blue potatoes. I got some really beautiful slices there on the ones I put in correctly. But I was in a hurry and tossing them in at random. And once again, I just gave those slices a quick chop with the salad scissors.
So far, I am very happy with this machine! It holds 14 cups so if you don't mind your foods beging mixed together, you can just keep on slicing or shredding and not have to empty out the container. It was easy to put together and take apart and due to the large size of the parts, very easy to clean. I did manage to get a speck of potato in one tight spot and I had to pick it out by hand. But this is nothing compared to the other food processor I once had.
I can see this thing saving me a LOT of time. And no more grated knuckles. I've been trying to shred beets for salad and it's very hard to do by hand. The beet slips out of my hand. I grate off the tip of my fingernail, etc. And I'm getting zucchini in my organic produce box next week. I make gluten free zucchini bread for my daughter. She is not totally raw. And grating that stuff by hand sure can be a pain!
I can see it coming in very handy for chopped salads as well. Now I might not like this for a salad I was to be serving for company since the pieces won't be uniform. But if I'm just going to eat it myself, I don't care if the pieces or uniform or not. And it sure will be quicker than doing the whole thing with the salad scissors, handy as they are.
Bought one at Walmart. I checked it to make sure it had all the pieces and none were broken. It was just fine! Wish I had checked to see that it had an instruction manual. Because it did not. I've since learned that I can print one off online, so that's not a real biggie.
I was in a hurry to get some dinner ready before my daughter came home. Had not tried to look for the instruction manual online at that point. I really wanted chopped vegetables. Have since learned that in order to get a good even dice to them, you have to do a lot of prep work, so this probably is not something I would do anyway. Plus I couldn't figure out how to chop anythint without the manual, but I could figure out how to slice.
I put carrots in first. Normally I get big carrots in my organic produce box but there were none this week. All I had were baby carrots. Because they were small and the chute is large, they were sort of sliced at random. A few of them were sliced lengthwise. What I wound up with was sort of a chopped carroty mess. No problem really for what I was using them for. I have some big salad shears and I just used those to give a smaller chop to the few lengthwise pieces.
Next came the celery. Now I was in a hurry and I ripped the bottoms of the stalks off by hand, rather than taking the time to cut them off neatly. Perhaps this is why my slices didn't come out all nice and pretty. Some were oddly sliced and the rest were at an angle like you'd do for a Chinese Stir-Fry. Again, no problem for what I was doing today, but not what I'd normally want.
Next came the onions. The slices were very nice and uniform, but you need to remember to put the onion in with the bottom of it square. Otherwise you won't get those nice ring shapes. I used smallish onions and cut them in half because I hadn't figured out at that point that the chute was expandable. And since I really didn't want slices, I used the salad scissors on those as well. I probably should have shredded the onion for what I was doing tonight, but this worked just as well. I love onion and don't mind big pieces of it but my daughter will not eat something with big chunks of onion. If I cut it up small she doesn't notice. She likes the onion flavor. I think it's just the sight of the onion that's offputting to her. She likes slices of green onion though.
The last thing I put in were some baby blue potatoes. I got some really beautiful slices there on the ones I put in correctly. But I was in a hurry and tossing them in at random. And once again, I just gave those slices a quick chop with the salad scissors.
So far, I am very happy with this machine! It holds 14 cups so if you don't mind your foods beging mixed together, you can just keep on slicing or shredding and not have to empty out the container. It was easy to put together and take apart and due to the large size of the parts, very easy to clean. I did manage to get a speck of potato in one tight spot and I had to pick it out by hand. But this is nothing compared to the other food processor I once had.
I can see this thing saving me a LOT of time. And no more grated knuckles. I've been trying to shred beets for salad and it's very hard to do by hand. The beet slips out of my hand. I grate off the tip of my fingernail, etc. And I'm getting zucchini in my organic produce box next week. I make gluten free zucchini bread for my daughter. She is not totally raw. And grating that stuff by hand sure can be a pain!
I can see it coming in very handy for chopped salads as well. Now I might not like this for a salad I was to be serving for company since the pieces won't be uniform. But if I'm just going to eat it myself, I don't care if the pieces or uniform or not. And it sure will be quicker than doing the whole thing with the salad scissors, handy as they are.