We’ve been long-term testing the Cuisinart Custom 14 since 2013, and it remains a workhorse in the kitchen. Plus, the wattage is impressive for a low-end appliance. You’ll need a blender if you want to make silky smoothies or to puree liquids like soup, which can splatter and leak out of a food processor’s doughnut-shaped bowl. Our testers were impressed with the dicing kit, which chopped firm vegetables like potatoes and carrots into even cubes. Earlier versions of the Cuisinart Custom 14 included a dough blade, and you can still purchase one through the Cuisinart website. It also tore parsley, whereas the KitchenAid produced a clean, even cut. The Sous Chef is more than twice the price of the Cuisinart Custom 14, and it’s more powerful (and much bigger) than most people need. However, since this was the only task this model excelled at, we don’t think it’s best for most people. Some food processors come with a lid that has a wider feed tube so you can process larger items, such as potatoes or cucumbers, without having to chop them up first. It comes with added blades for creaming and dough mixing, and the basics are operated by a three-speed dial. The Kuhn Rikon Pull Chop 2 Cup Food Chopper snags our top spot because of its uniqueness among hand choppers, using an easy pulling action to operate its blades, which work like those of a small food processor (view it at Amazon). The materials all feel well-made, from the stylish outer shell to the strong blades. Both cookbook authors we spoke with essentially said these add-ons were a waste of money, so we didn’t test any. If you a have cupboard full of small appliances and want to declutter your kitchen. In fact, many food processors do all these things and more. They do this by working faster than we are able to – for instance, by chopping several vegetables in a matter of seconds. Food processor blades are not designed to be sharpened. You’ll find replacement bowls, food pushers, blades, and various other attachments for the Cuisinart Custom 14 and the Breville Sous Chef 16 Pro (though we should note that they can be quite expensive). They’re twice the price of most other models on the market, but live up to their name. We’re curious about how it compares to the Thermomix and plan to test it soon. The motor on the Elemental was noisy, and the base is very lightweight. You’ll need storage space for this machine – the amount of attachments is mind-boggling! It has a working bowl capacity of 1.7 litres so there’s no need to do stuff in batches. The obvious drawback to all of these attachments is that they take up a lot of space, and they may not get much use (how often do you make fries, for example?). It’s worth bearing in mind that a food processor is not a magic bullet for food preparation. If you find tasks like chopping nuts, slicing vegetables, and shredding cheese too tedious and time-consuming to perform by hand, you should consider getting a food processor. There are techniques to learn – like adding ingredients to smoothies in the right order to ensure an even blend, or using your eye to gauge the progress of your ingredients with more exactness than a specified prep time can provide. Still, it beats spending ages chopping, whisking or blending by hand. Read our full review of the VonShef food processor. Braun Ultra powerful and Quiet motor (FP3020) 12 Cup Food Processor 600 watt motors for Processing $$$ 4.8 : 2. Meanwhile, senior kitchen and appliance editor Marguerite Preston still uses a decades-old Cuisinart Custom 14 that she inherited from her parents. A great all-rounder. Cuisinart released the Complete Chef Cooking Food Processor, a $700 machine that can cook as well as chop and slice. This processor also comes with a limited one-year product warranty and has a 25-year warranty on the motor—by far the longest warranty on a motor of any of the models we tested. If you’re making lots of portions at once, a food processor could be very handy. In addition to the standard blades, the Sous Chef comes with a reversible shredding disk and an adjustable slicing disk that goes from a whisper-thin 0.33 millimeters to a generous 8 millimeters (it’s a true alternative to using a mandoline). Samsung’s Galaxy Watch Active2 is the best smartwatch to use with an Android phone, whether your phone is made by Samsung or not. The point of a food processor is to make preparing food easier and more efficient. The Sous Chef is solidly built, with a hefty base that weighs about 15½ pounds (excluding the bowl). Ninja NJ100 Express Chop Food Processor. But the way the bowl is put together can make a huge difference in how easy a processor is to use. Most full-size processors come with a wide feed tube that’s fitted with a food presser, which has a narrower feed tube (with its own presser) in the center. 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. But if your current machine’s motor base is so lightweight that the appliance stutters across the counter while it’s running, or if the motor seizes while it’s kneading dough, you should consider upgrading to a model that has a heavier build and a better motor. Finally, we cleaned the bowls, lids, disks, and food pressers of each model by hand—eight times. The grating disk also shredded soft mozzarella cheese without getting gummed up. •    Loudness Breville clearly put a lot of thought into other design elements as well. It comes with a citrus press, which is a bit laborious unless you have 10 lemons to juice. Having cottoned on to the popular potential of this convenient way to cook, Cuisinart launched its pioneering domestic food processor the next decade. A food processor can help you slice, dice, chop and blitz. Affordable and attractive, this food processor is good value for money and works through ingredients quickly and evenly. The Cuisinart FP-12DCN Elite Collection Food Processor performed well in our tests, but it came with a gasket on the lid that frequently trapped flour and sticky ingredients. Subscription offer: Get 5 issues for only £5. Another staffer (who admitted to being a little rough on her machine) just replaced her Cuisinart with a new one after 11 years of use. Food processors often involve a smorgasbord of accessories and functions. We made pizza dough in each full-size processor to see if the motor could withstand the rigors of kneading. There’s a reversible shredding disk with coarse and fine grates. Both produced consistent results in our carrot and cheese grating tests. The slicing attachment can also come in handy when making boulangère potatoes and other dishes containing very thinly-sliced hard vegetables. In fact, of all the food processors, blenders, and immersion blenders we’ve tested for various guides, we found making mayo easiest in a mini food processor like the Food Chopper. The KitchenAid 13-Cup Food Processor with ExactSlice System and the Cuisinart FP-12DCN Elite Collection Food Processor also have this handy feature, but most models (including the Cuisinart Custom 14) require that you loosen the lid before removing the bowl. If you'd only use a processor occasionally or for smaller quantities like curries, chopped nuts, breadcrumbs and pesto, then a mini food processor that can be quickly pulled out of the cupboard is all you need. After testing models with storage boxes, we found that such boxes are convenient for keeping attachments organized, and they’re worth investing in if your model doesn’t come with one. If you have any questions, suggestions for future reviews or spot anything that has changed in price or availability, please get in touch at goodfoodwebsite@immediate.co.uk. Almost all use a rotating gear to turn their various accessories, which will typically include discs for slicing or grating, and blade arrays for chopping or mixing. Picture Name Feature Price Rating; Picture. Its secret: a patented stainless steel blade that reverses to deliver high-speed results. Most mini choppers don’t have hefty bases like full-size processors do, and the Food Chopper is no exception. And though we’re not huge fans of the mini bowls on most of the big processors, we liked the Sous Chef’s 2½-cup bowl best among the ones we’ve tried. Mini food processors have bowls ranging in capacity from about 1½ cups to 6 cups, but we focused on those with a capacity of about three cups. Toss a handful into the food processor bowl. It chopped vegetables more evenly than the other mini models we tested. The Cuisinart FP-13DGM Elemental 13 Cup Food Processor and Dicing Kit didn’t chop as evenly as our picks. If you want a single tool that can juice fruits, knead dough, and mix thick batter, you will need to find a food processor with the right amount of power and types of accessories to handle food prep. Ultimately, a food processor will make food prep more speedy and efficient, working much faster than we ever could to slice, dice, chop and blitz ingredients in moments, removing the need for repetitive manual action. Read our full review of the VonShef food processor. The wider feed slot is brilliant for slicing things like cabbage for coleslaw, and it also means a lot of things can be sliced in half and popped through, saving time. It comes with a handful of accessories and disks that are needed to complete common kitchen tasks, but nothing extra. But the smaller tube needs to be narrow enough to keep carrots and other thin items upright during slicing. The 14-cup bowl doesn’t leak, and the controls are exactly what you need. Although there’s some overlap in what they can do, food processors and blenders aren’t interchangeable appliances. It’s slightly slower at grating and slicing than other models, even though it has a 1000W motor, but slices evenly and produced the best pastry by far. Its smaller, 12-cup capacity was also more limiting than the Cuisinart’s 14-cup bowl. 4. Some full-size models come with an extra, smaller bowl that essentially acts as a mini food processor, but in most cases, we found that a dedicated mini processor did a better job. It has two speeds, a safety interlock to stop the machine from being … Buying guide for best food processors. 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. Low-quality machines, which are typically lighter, often skid across the counter when processing dough, or the motor may even seize up. •    Speed of processing I pit and chop dates with a knife, but there's no reason you couldn't use a food processor in short bursts (adding a little flour is a good idea). We especially appreciate that the bowl has a handle, since we struggled to remove bowls that didn’t have one, especially when we were working with greasy hands. Unlike those of some other models we tested, the Cuisinart’s base remained stable on the counter, even when processing double batches of dough. The components are pared back but highly effective, working through ingredients quickly and efficiently. You can usually purchase everything from a juicing attachment to julienne disks separately, but such extras often go unused. The Cuisinart has a strong motor and a heavy base (roughly 18 pounds with the bowl on) that keeps it stable. Although a food processor is not an absolutely essential piece of equipment, because you can certainly chop, grate, slice, knead and mix everything by hand, it does do all these things very quickly and efficiently and saves you time and energy. In terms of pure performance, the Breville Sous Chef 16 Pro was hands down the best food processor we tested. In our tests, we looked for blades and grating disks that were sharp out of the box and durable enough to remain sharp over years of use, so that they could chop delicate herbs and tough nuts evenly, grate cheese uniformly, and slice vegetables cleanly. Since dates get so sticky when you chop them, it’s helpful to add a drying agent to the food processor. We also like that you can remove the work bowl with the lid attached. Michael Sullivan has been a kitchen writer for Wirecutter since 2015. We also made a 1-cup batch of mayonnaise in the processors to see how quickly and evenly they could produce a stable emulsification. Wirecutter is reader-supported. Most were evenly chopped, but there were a handful of nuts that remained in large pieces. *At the time of publishing, the price was $230. Ultimately, a food processor will make food prep more speedy and efficient, working much faster than we ever could to slice, dice, chop and blitz ingredients in moments, removing the need for repetitive manual action. This food processor also has a straightforward interface, with just two buttons, and one bowl. The Food Chopper also minced parsley cleanly, whereas the Cuisinart Mini-Prep Plus tore it, causing it to oxidize faster. We have a guide to the best countertop blenders (as well as to the best handheld immersion blenders and the best personal blenders) if you’re interested in getting one. [4] Unfortunately, the last time I tried to actually process them together the correct way, I used my dinky $12 Toastmaster processor, an experiment which both completely burnt out the processor engine, and blew one of the … It also comes with a brilliant dough hook, which made the lightest of doughs, and a fantastic egg whisk, ideal for creating fluffy whites. They can remove the need for physical effort and technique, especially in processes like whisking, where a steady manual action might otherwise need to be sustained over several minutes. It chopped vegetables quicker and more evenly than other models and has additional helpful features too. Food capacity: For small food processor, it is best to choose 3-cup capacity for optimum food fitting. Yours should last you a long time. Step 1: Dates possess a stone seed in the middle which might not be a good addition to your recipe. (Liquid tended to leak out of the Prep’s bowl.). Large capacity or mini, nothing in-between: In the past we tested food processors ranging in capacity from 11 to 14 cups, which cookbook authors Jean Anderson and Norene Gilletz told us was the ideal size for most home cooks. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. They are usually up to 1 litre in capacity. Best do-it-all option: Ninja 3-in-1 Food Processor with Auto-iQ BN800UK 9 You get great value for money with the Ninja despite its high price with this 3-in-1 processor set The bowl capacity of the Tibek Multi-function food processor stands at 12 cups and this is more than enough to meet the needs of a large family. Bowls with fewer parts and accessories are easier to assemble and clean, as are bowls with fewer nooks and crannies between the parts. The KitchenAid chopped more evenly than the other mini processors we tested, and it did so quickly. CR’s take: Cuisinart introduced the food processor to Americans in the early 1970s, and it has been a recognized brand in the category ever since. To get the very best results, you’ll need to add ingredients of a size, shape and consistency that suits the processor and function. It has a simple design and performs well: In our tests, it … I prefer the food processor, as the dates are less likely to get caught in the blades, as with a blender. 5. For the price, this machine packs a punch, coming loaded with various functions, including a juicer attachment and emulsification disc. The food processors featured in this review were tested against a wide range of factors. It will allow you to prep a range of food—whether you’re grating cheese, chopping nuts, slicing vegetables, or kneading dough—at lightning speed. You can sometimes find cheaper, secondhand parts on eBay, but just be sure you get the right model number. Read our guide Food processor attachments explained. You should also consider how much of a technical challenge you are willing to tackle. Food processor vs. blender: Which one should you get? We think that the combination of this processor’s size, weight, and hefty price of $700 will most likely be too much for those just looking for a food processor. The machine also seized up while preparing pizza dough and was noisier than other models we tested. A food processor is a motorised appliance that quickly performs food prep tasks traditionally carried out by hand. Our testers also preferred the Cuisinart Custom 14’s 14-cup capacity over the Elite’s 12-cup capacity. The 1200 watts of power means the motor works to grind and chop nuts in the food processor for just a few seconds. The Cuisinart DFP-14BCNY 14-Cup Food Processor is our top pick because of its versatility and comparable performance next to best-in-class competitors—at a fraction of the price. Full-size processors are best for chopping nuts. We appreciate that Breville provides a storage case for the attachments, but the box takes up almost as much cupboard space as the machine itself. You can’t knead dough or shred ingredients in it, but you can grind or chop small portions of vegetables or nuts, which is more tedious to do by hand. The included slicing disk makes approximately 5-millimeter slices, which is fine for most tasks, but you’ll probably want the 2-millimeter slicing disk for making homemade potato chips. The Black + Decker 3-in-1 Easy Assembly 8-Cup Food Processor minces, chops, ... To round up the best food processors on the market today, ... Netflix release date and more. While many people use their food processor for mincing vegetables, this appliance is also your best friend for easily grating cheese, slicing potatoes for a gratin, grinding fresh bread crumbs, or quickly cutting butter into flour to make pie dough. This mini food processor is the best appliance you can bring home for helping you with chopping, pureeing and mincing tasks that are involved in the preparation of recipes like soups, dressings, humus, salsa and much more. Our criteria included: •    The strength of the blades, jugs and mixing bowls included We can’t justify paying more for a smaller machine. In our efforts to choose which models to test, we also looked at reviews from other publications, such as Serious Eats, and examined user reviews on Amazon, Macy’s, and other sites. It wasn’t able to chop as evenly as the KitchenAid 3.5 Cup Food Chopper, and it moved across the counter as it struggled to chop a tough jumbo carrot. And we didn’t notice any straining or stuttering of this model’s 240-watt motor, even when it was chopping a fibrous jumbo carrot. It wasn’t able to chop as evenly as the Breville Sous Chef 16 Pro or the Cuisinart Custom 14. This food processor is a customer favorite for a reason with over 2,000 positive reviews on Amazon. We recommend this large, 16-cup processor only if you’re cooking for a crowd multiple times a week. We like its slightly retro, sleek design, and the base is also available in several colors (each of which has a different model number). •    Ease of use One major perk is how quiet it is. We tested leading brands including Russell Hobbs, KitchenAid, Cuisinart and Magimix to find the best food processors for basic kitchen tasks. Magic Bullet Baby Bullet Baby Care System 6-date dial storage cups But you can buy additional slicing disks through Cuisinart if you want them. We’ve found that it’s slightly annoying to clean under the on/off buttons, but a damp sponge or paper towel makes the task easier. The Sous Chef powered through an entire russet potato in less than a second—noticeably faster than any of the other models. The Breville Sous Chef 12 BFP660SIL food processor did well in our tests, but it didn’t outperform the Breville Sous Chef 16 Pro or our top pick, the Cuisinart Custom 14. They're a bit drier and chewier than freshly chopped dates. The Food Chopper looks almost identical to a full-size processor, except that it has a knob you can adjust to either “chop” or “puree.” The chop setting moves the blade at a slower rpm, and the puree button operates at a faster rpm. The metal whisk incorporates more air into the mix, the blender copes with hot food and makes fantastic soups. We read a few reviews by people who disliked how the Cuisinart Custom 14’s lid locks with the feed tube in the back rather than in the front (which is standard for most models). Food processors are kitchen all-stars—they make quick work of laborious jobs like shredding potatoes, slicing vegetables and chopping nuts. However, its simplicity doesn’t come at the cost of performance. The Sous Chef is the only model we tested that had an LCD timer (which counts up and down), and this model also has retractable cord storage. This KitchenAid comes with relatively few parts and it disassembles easily for cleaning. But it’s oversized and significantly more expensive than the Cuisinart, and it comes with a bulky bundle of accessories that you may not need. The Breville Sous Chef diced tomatoes and onions evenly, and it chopped nuts to a more consistent texture than the Cuisinart. We love that it comes with only one bowl and two operating buttons: pulse and on. The Cuisinart’s three-year warranty on parts and five-year warranty on the motor aren’t the best among the models we tested, but they’re still pretty good. In our tests, the Cuisinart tackled a multitude of chopping, shredding, and blending tasks exceptionally well, and it’s built more solidly than other processors in its price range. It has a neat footprint and its smart design would look good on show in a kitchen. The Cuisinart Mini-Prep Plus was our former mini chopper pick. It also comes in handy when making recipes like cauliflower rice, biscuit dough, cake batter and homemade tomato ketchup. © 2021 Wirecutter, Inc., A New York Times Company. As well as the usual grating and slicing discs, it comes with a huge array of excellent extras, including a blender, twin-geared metal whisk and folding tool. Dates have a pit in the center, so you’ll want to remove it before you start chopping. The larger tube should be big enough to easily fit a block of cheese or a potato, so you don’t have to spend time cutting food into pieces that are small enough to fit. Minimalist in design but not in stature, this is a serious hunk of die-cast metal finished to an incredibly high spec. Year after year, we’ve made slaws, grated cheese, blended dips, chopped nuts, and kneaded pizza dough in it—and it continues to work well. HalfPint April 4, 2016 In addition to soaking, I … The reasonably priced Cuisinart Custom 14 Food Processor has been our top pick since 2013 because it does everything a great food processor should do, without any unnecessary extras. Finally, the Cuisinart Custom 14’s work bowl was easier to clean than the bowls of most of the other models we tested. To help us suss out the features you should look for in a great food processor, we turned to two best-selling authors of food processing cookbooks: Jean Anderson, the James Beard Award–winning author of Process This, and Norene Gilletz, author of The New Food Processor Bible. But we find dough blades unnecessary and have successfully prepared doughs using regular chopping blades for years. With some careful layering, you can store all of the Cuisinart’s blades and disks in its work bowl, with the lid on, which saves a bit of storage space (and keeps you from gouging a hand on a loose blade in a drawer). The size of the feed tubes in the lid (used to insert potatoes, carrots, or other hunks of food to be sliced or shredded) also makes a difference. Beer 52 exclusive offer: Get a free case of craft beer worth £24. We tested leading brands including Kenwood, Magimix and KitchenAid to see which performed best. Washing food processor attachments by hand can be a real pain. Sal Vaglica, The Best Food Processors, Serious Eats, October 17, 2017, Jean Anderson, author, Process This, phone interview, July 2013, Norene Gilletz, author, The New Food Processor Bible, phone interview, July 2013. Also, its mini bowl insert did not chop almonds evenly, so we recommend using its 16-cup bowl for this task. However, at just under 2 pounds, it has a slightly heavier base than other mini models, which helps keep it stable. •    Kitchen footprint and storage In our tests, we found that a 14-cup capacity food processor bowl was ideal for most people. Making pizza dough was our most motor-intensive test, and the Custom 14 kneaded it effortlessly, without wiggling across the counter like some other processors we tried. Michael Sullivan has been a staff writer on the kitchen team at Wirecutter since 2016. •    Functions. The feed tube is very wide, so thin items like carrots fall to the side, and the rounded lid creates a wide gap around the perimeter of the slicing blade, allowing large pieces of food to slip through, into the bowl. Its 1,200-watt motor and smart design save you time in use and cleaning. One task this processor doesn’t excel at is chopping whole almonds evenly, but that’s typical of most mini choppers. Dates are a sticky fruit, so you want to take a couple precautions to keep the blades from gumming up. While many manufacturers offer inexpensive mini food processors we found the KitchenAid 3.5 Cup Mini Food Processor to be the sturdiest and highest quality of the lot. With over 3,000 positive reviews, this Cuisinart food processor has made its way onto Amazon's best seller list—and we aren't surprised. Read our full review of the Russell Hobbs Retro food processor. Accessories : Look for food processor with powerful motor and non-slip base for stable processing. Kitchen gadgets to mix and prepare any ingredient you can think of. Read our full review of the Sage The Kitchen Wizz Peel & Dice. Do you want something that’s really well suited to chopping and slicing, or are you more interested in functions like blending and mixing? By contrast, our upgrade pick, the Breville Sous Chef 16 Pro, comes with a plethora of disks and accessories, requiring more storage space. And this KitchenAid is a great option for people who don’t want to invest in a $200 machine. We’ll test it soon and update this guide accordingly. In fact, despite the 16-cup Sous Chef’s many accessories, it was one of the easiest models to clean. Food processors are an easy way to slice, dice, chop, and shred food in seconds. As for cleaning, The New Food Processor Bible’s Gilletz recommends putting water and a few drops of dish soap into the work bowl and running the machine. The accessories are particularly sharp and come in a large storage case, which is worth bearing in mind if you’re low on kitchen space. We recommend the inexpensive KitchenAid 3.5 Cup Food Chopper for anyone who wants to make small batches of dips, spreads, or mirepoix. In our tests, this processor even performed better than the mini bowl attachments that come with some of the larger processors. The best mini food processors from Cuisinart, KitchenAid, Ninja and more whether you want to puree baby food, emulsify dressing, or grate and chop vegetables. We weren’t impressed with the Magimix by Robot-Coupe 14-Cup Food Processor. This is a great food processor if you’re looking for a reasonably priced machine that will do the basics with minimum fuss. It’s too small for kneading bread dough and lacks the attachments to shred or slice, but it’s great for completing basic tasks quickly, and it’s easier to clean and store than a full-size model. This model is easy to clean, and the attachments store neatly inside the bowl, preventing clutter. This mini, 3.5-cup processor is too small for making bread dough or coleslaw, but it’s the ideal size for chopping one onion or making small batches of mayo or vinaigrette.