Blender

So probably one of the most exciting items – partially due to fact I can use it without having to work out…is the blender.  Realizing that I am not a morning person and downing a breakfast is going to be hard I decided to blend some healthy smoothies. Upon this revolutionary and enlightened moment (patent pending) I found myself standing in front of the kitchen cabinets and without a blender in sight. Since I spent some time doing research on a blender I decided to dedicate a bit lengthier post about it. I know, Yawn…pretty boring but someone out there might find it useful. A bit of help from Google and reviews from Amazon shoppers I went of to local Wall-Mart looking to buy a “Ninja Master Prep” but they were out of stock. After reading some more reviews it seemed like this item had ‘too much of a blade’ to clean and after looking at it more closely it was more of a ‘food processor’ than I needed at this point. Apparently it is one cool, inexpensive machine that people love. As an alternative, store employee pointed me in direction “Magic Bullet” which was a on a sale for around $40.

I bought as I waned to keep it simple and this product has been so heavily hyped I had to try it. Soon I realized this ‘small blender’ is a whole set that actually took up more space than standard blender. What got me sold was the fact that it had an ‘extra piece’ of a pitcher-like blender. Unfortunately Magic was short lived as the blender/pitcher attachment would not lock on properly and initiate the start. After it did, it barely could do any damage on 2 ice cubes…well, it rounded them into balls but far from blending into anything drinkable. I made two fruit smoothies with it and dodged using ice. Honestly, I just got annoyed with its on/off mechanism and realized what everyone was talking about its drive shaft  being made of plastic. This and the fact it only had 1 attachment I wanted. I returned it for a refund and went of following a tip to go to Bed-Bath and Beyond store. It sounded as good as any place to get a blender so who cares, it was down the street and convenient.

After looking over some choices I settled for Oster BCBG08 for $39.99. I have used it 9 times so far and it seems like a pretty decent item.

Casing or stand of the blander is plastic (although it has a metal look) but the pitcher is glass with all metal drive shaft and blender blade. Here are a few shots of the blender:

So far this thing looks and work pretty good and has been easy to clean. Fairly cheap and it does the job. If all fails I can always make some margaritas…again a win-win!