Best Food Processors And Choppers Of 2021
A food processor should be used when the outcome is to be eaten with a fork or spoon, so solid or semi-solid ingredients work best. You don’t necessarily need a liquid element here, either, making it the right choice for crafting bread crumbs, dough, shredded cheese, and chopped, sliced, or diced vegetables. You can use it to make riced cauliflower, chutney, and even minced meat. Food processor blades rotate much slower than blender blades and are shaped differently, giving you greater control and more precise cuts.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is charged with protecting the public from unreasonable risks of injury or death associated with the use of thousands of types of consumer products. Deaths, injuries, and property damage from consumer product incidents cost the nation more than $1 trillion annually. CPSC’s work to ensure the safety of consumer products has contributed to a decline in the rate of deaths and injuries associated with consumer products over the past 40 years.
The extra-large feed tube slices whole fruit and veggies, while the 720-watt motor is powerful enough to knead bread dough with ease. With a sleek countertop presence in brushed stainless, this food processor comes complete with a stainless steel slicing disc, stainless steel shredding disc and chopping blade. Cuisinart makes one other 13-cup food processor, which also comes with a 4.5-cup nesting bowl. While your food processor is primarily two spinning blades, there are a host of other attachments that can expand your processor’s abilities. Some food processor models, like the Braun, come with a lot of these attachments while others must be purchased separately so depending on your food processing needs this may be something to consider. Remember, attachments shouldn’t be difficult to clean and you should definitely check if they can go in the dishwasher.
To process small batches of ingredients, you may want to consider getting a mini food processor—even if you already have a full-size version. Mini processors are most useful for tasks such as chopping one onion, preparing salad dressing, or making a small batch of pesto. A mini cuisinart griddler elite model will process smaller quantities more efficiently than a full-size model, and its diminutive size means a mini model is easier to move around a counter, store, and clean. Looking for a food processor but don’t have the storage space to donate to a full-sized model?
You can also whisk, whip, and stir; it takes just 30 seconds to make a fresh batch of whipped cream. Like the 3.5-cup model, it features a convenient drizzle basin for making dressings and sauces. Hamilton Beach currently makes more than 20 food processors ranging from 8 to 14 cups, none of which are particularly pricey (the most expensive at the time of this writing is $129.99 MSRP). The least expensive, however, is an 8-cup processor with two speeds and a pulse setting. It comes with two blades for chopping/mixing and reversible slicing/shredding, a 300-watt motor, and easy-to-read measurement marks for pouring liquids through the chute. All removable parts are dishwasher safe, and when it’s time to put everything away, in-bowl storage makes cleanup easier than ever.
That’s because its lid has a small indent to hold oil and a small hole that allows the oil to pour directly onto the blades so you have a consistent, measured stream. With this method, the mayonnaise comes together without your having to control the flow of oil. Beyond the main blade and one disk each for shredding and slicing, you don’t need much else. Many food processors also come with a dough blade made of plastic, but we found that a metal blade mixed dough just as well, so we don’t think the dough blade is essential. You can usually purchase everything from a juicing attachment to julienne disks separately, but such extras often go unused.
Each recipe was repeated twice in each machine using the same ingredients in the same amounts across all brands. Here’s how it all shook out and my recommendation for the three best food processors available, which we update periodically. The Cuisinart FP-13DGM Elemental 13 Cup Food Processor and Dicing Kit didn’t chop as evenly as our picks. Our testers were impressed with the dicing kit, which chopped firm vegetables like potatoes and carrots into even cubes. However, since this was the only task this model excelled at, we don’t think it’s best for most people. The motor on the Elemental was noisy, and the base is very lightweight.
It also comes with two feeding tubes (again, you can select the option you’d prefer for the job at hand). The machine is quick and powerful, speeding up dinner’s arrival on the table. Since it’s quite large, it might not be a good option if you only have limited counter space.