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Don’t Waste Your Money: Inexpensive food processors

Posted at 7:36 PM, Dec 11, 2013
and last updated 2013-12-11 19:36:17-05

As a home pastry chef, Teryn Beyer saves tons of time by using her food processor.

“If I have a big order for carrot cakes, instead of sitting there with the grater and the carrots, I can just throw them all in here and it grates them perfectly... or it can chop nuts, or anything!”

In the market for a food processor? Consumer Reports tested 20.

A Breville Sous Chef vaulted past the top-rated Cuisinart processor acing many of Consumer Reports` tough tests including slicing mushrooms and shredding carrots.

“And it`s relatively quiet, so you can easily have a conversation while you`re working,” says the chef.

This Sous Chef has a 16-cup work bowl, a mini-bowl insert, and a case where you can neatly and safely store a ton of blades and accessories. But it`s 18 inches tall and weighs nearly 20 pounds.

“This is clearly a high-end product that requires premium counter space. It does also come at a premium price, $400!” says the chef.

If you can live with less than perfect results, consider $50 Hamilton Beach, model number 70730. It has a decent-size 10-cup work bowl and is fairly light for easy storage.

And while it didn`t do a great job puréeing peas, it was very good at slicing mushrooms and did an excellent job shredding carrots.

“The downside is, it`s very noisy!” the chef says.

Still, it does a lot really well and at a price that`s hard to beat.

Consumer Reports also tested food choppers.

These mini-processors don`t slice or shred but are great for small, quick jobs, like chopping nuts and herbs or grating a small chunk of cheese.

Most are easy to store like the Cuisinart mini prep plus DLC2A.

Consumer Reports recommends it. It comes in several colors and costs about $40.