Scrolling through Living Styles Australia‘s sales today, I noticed a great deal on the handy little Cuisinart Portable/Personal Blender. It’s well worth subscribing to Living Styles’ newsletter for some great deals.
This little personal blender claims to make smoothies, mince herbs, whip up drinks…. It has a 350 watt motor and BPA free jars. The cool thing with the jars is that they are dishwasher safe, whereas my Vitamix jugs are not.
The blender comes with a 960ml blender jar, 240ml chopping cup, and 4x 480ml travel cups. I used to have a little bullet blender, K-Mart special, and loved it for its travel cups and for little things like grinding coffee beans, pepper corns etc. The great thing about these small blenders is how easy they are to clean. Only a small cup to wash, vs a huge jug on the Vitamix.
The downside with personal blenders, in my opinion, is that they don’t have the grunt to make a smoothie smooth. My mum has a Ninja and she doesn’t mind the lumps. Me…. I hate them with a passion. In my Froothie Optimum 9400 smoothies came out ok as long as you didn’t add chia seed (or didn’t mind chia seed WHOLE in your smoothie) or Kale or Celery or…..
In my Vitamix 750… Oh my God! Smooooooooooth! Not a lump in sight. No seeds left. No Kale strings. No Celery pieces. I’ll never go back. But I paid 10 times of what this little fella costs, so let’s give it a chance.
At the moment this blender is $105, that’s 44% off. I had a look at the reviews and will out line the pro’s and con’s of the Cuisinart Compact Portable Blending and Chopping System below, as indicated by other reviewers and users of this blender.
Pro’s of the Cuisinart Compact Portable Blending and Chopping System
- Travel cups are very convenient
- People enjoy making 4 different smoothies for 4 different tastes in the travel cups
- Compact
- Great value for money
- No problems blending ice, oatmeal etc
- Breeze to clean
- Quick and easy to use
- Stylish
- BPA free cups
- Limited 3 year warranty
- Can blend Kiwi fruit with skin on and you don’t notice the skin
- Pulse function
Cons of the Cuisinart Compact Portable Blending and Chopping System
- Not much power/speed
- Crushes nuts and blends them to nut butter, but can only produce about 1/3 the cup at a time.
- Drinking cups aren’t sealed on top (they are like coffee-cup lids)
- Noisy
- If you blend something thick it sometimes gets a little overwhelmed and starts to struggle
- Chunks and ingredients often get stuck at the top of the blending cup
- It doesn’t cut the food very fine, a bit grainy
- The blender only lasted 1 – 1 1/2 years for some reviewers before burning out
- Doesn’t blend frozen berries without adding a lot of liquid
- Burnt motor smell
Find the Cuisinart personal blender at Living Styles, on special now!
