Yesterday, I was reading review on Amazon. com where a person was
saying how she even shred some chicken in food processor that wasn't
pricey. I forgot which one she was talking about.

I am interested in getting a FP that is not too pricey that can shred
some small amount of meat (for Chinese stiry fry) as well as chop
onions, not puree, grind nuts (small amount). I want to chop red
onions and dry them in a dehydrator. Is there such a thing? I want
something that doesn't take up space.

Note: I have a Braun hand belnder (200Watt) that comes with a beaker
and a bowl that I use for onion, garlic, tomatoes.

How much do you want to spend? I have a Kitchen Aid I am going to
review in the near future.



-------------------------------------
Pans and MORE...© Home of unbiased cookware and bakeware reviews.
http://pansandmore.com/

wrote:
> How much do you want to spend? I have a Kitchen Aid I am going to
> review in the near future.

I don't know. I guess it would depend on the watage of the item,
feature, etc.

>
>
>
> -------------------------------------
> Pans and MORE...© Home of unbiased cookware and bakeware reviews.
> http://pansandmore.com/

"amanda" > wrote in message
ups.com...

wrote:
> How much do you want to spend? I have a Kitchen Aid I am going to
> review in the near future.

I don't know. I guess it would depend on the watage of the item,
feature, etc.

The wattage you need depends on what you are going to do with the machine.
If you are going to make dough, then you need more watts. For most jobs,
450-600 watts will be fine, and that is the general range of what you will
find in the market place. My old 400 watt Braun FP worked for years, even
making bread dough. It was still working OK when I replaced it, but was
starting to make ominous sounds when I used it for dough. I got a Wolfgang
Puck FP as a gift. It is 900 watts. I like it, but there are problems and
I can't recommend it. I think if I were to buy another FP, I would get the
KitchenAid wide-mouth unit. The WP FP needs a bit of redesign, in my
opinion, but it gets wonderful review on the HSN website. Sometimes I think
that the 900 watt unit is a bit too powerful. I wish it had a variable
speed control.

Vox Humana wrote:
> The wattage you need depends on what you are going to do with the machine.
> If you are going to make dough, then you need more watts. For most jobs,
> 450-600 watts will be fine, and that is the general range of what you will
> find in the market place.

Wattage is largely a marketing gimmick. The true power of an appliance
would be rated in horsepower. Unfortunately, manufacturers rarely
provide this information.

In Cook's Illustrated's November issue, they bring up this point in
their review of stand mixers. You'll also find a discussion of this at
<http://forum.kitchenaid.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2378>.

In article >,
Andy Boze > wrote:
> Wattage is largely a marketing gimmick. The true power of an appliance
> would be rated in horsepower. Unfortunately, manufacturers rarely
> provide this information.

Sure they do, since Watts is directly converted to horsepower: 749 Watts
is 1 horsepower. In the case of a food processor, you'll only have the
few % losses in the gearbox to derate it from the advertised wattage to
useful work. Given the supply voltage, the current drawn, and the power
factor or the load you can work out how much energy is going into that
appliance to be converted to useful work.

Maybe you mean torque (foot pounds or Newton metres) as the important
non-provided information. A graph of torque vs speed may be useful to
work out where your appliance does its most efficient work, or if it
even suitable for some tasks.

Bill

"Bill" > wrote in message
...
> In article >,
> Andy Boze > wrote:
>> Wattage is largely a marketing gimmick. The true power of an appliance
>> would be rated in horsepower. Unfortunately, manufacturers rarely
>> provide this information.
>
> Sure they do, since Watts is directly converted to horsepower: 749
> Watts
> is 1 horsepower. In the case of a food processor, you'll only have the
> few % losses in the gearbox to derate it from the advertised wattage to
> useful work. Given the supply voltage, the current drawn, and the power
> factor or the load you can work out how much energy is going into that
> appliance to be converted to useful work.
>
> Maybe you mean torque (foot pounds or Newton metres) as the important
> non-provided information. A graph of torque vs speed may be useful to
> work out where your appliance does its most efficient work, or if it
> even suitable for some tasks.
>
> Bill

Ah grasshopper. If the wire in the windings is small and cheap, you can
suck a lot of watts that get converted into heat and not output from the
motor. And if there isn't much steel in the motor, again to save money,
it might saturate and let the current shoot up and not do much useful
work. Ever wonder why an immersion blender might say to only run for a
minute continuous? Or why kitchen aid mixers don't want to be run too
long continuously? How many of the "600 watts" of my new pro 600 go into
making the motor and case hot? Gets pretty warm in about 10 min. What
is the specific heat of a kitchen aid mixer?

del

On Mon, 06 Feb 2006 15:50:33 +1100, Bill > wrote:

>Sure they do, since Watts is directly converted to horsepower: 749 Watts
>is 1 horsepower. In the case of a food processor, you'll only have the
>few % losses in the gearbox to derate it from the advertised wattage to
>useful work. Given the supply voltage, the current drawn, and the power
>factor or the load you can work out how much energy is going into that
>appliance to be converted to useful work.

It's watts of _output_ that may be converted to horsepower; what manufacturers
provide is watts of _input power consumed_. Not all motors have the same
efficiency, and efficiency varies over a wide range. Without knowing that
efficiency, you have no idea how much power a motor is producing.

And then on top of that you've got the drivetrain losses, etc.

-- Larry

Andy Boze wrote:
> Vox Humana wrote:
> > The wattage you need depends on what you are going to do with the machine.
> > If you are going to make dough, then you need more watts. For most jobs,
> > 450-600 watts will be fine, and that is the general range of what you will
> > find in the market place.
>
> Wattage is largely a marketing gimmick. The true power of an appliance
> would be rated in horsepower.

HP is directly proportional to wattage (9th grade Physics).




>Unfortunately, manufacturers rarely
> provide this information.
>
> In Cook's Illustrated's November issue, they bring up this point in
> their review of stand mixers. You'll also find a discussion of this at
> <http://forum.kitchenaid.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2378>.

Del Cecchi wrote:
> "Bill" > wrote in message
> ...
> > In article >,
> > Andy Boze > wrote:
> >> Wattage is largely a marketing gimmick. The true power of an appliance
> >> would be rated in horsepower. Unfortunately, manufacturers rarely
> >> provide this information.
> >
> > Sure they do, since Watts is directly converted to horsepower: 749
> > Watts is 1 horsepower. In the case of a food processor, you'll only have the
> > few % losses in the gearbox to derate it from the advertised wattage to
> > useful work. Given the supply voltage, the current drawn, and the power
> > factor or the load you can work out how much energy is going into that
> > appliance to be converted to useful work.
> >
> > Maybe you mean torque (foot pounds or Newton metres) as the important
> > non-provided information. A graph of torque vs speed may be useful to
> > work out where your appliance does its most efficient work, or if it
> > even suitable for some tasks.
> >
> > Bill
>
> Ah grasshopper. If the wire in the windings is small and cheap, you can
> suck a lot of watts that get converted into heat and not output from the
> motor.

So design matters?


>And if there isn't much steel in the motor, again to save money,
> it might saturate and let the current shoot up and not do much useful
> work. Ever wonder why an immersion blender might say to only run for a
> minute continuous? Or why kitchen aid mixers don't want to be run too
> long continuously? How many of the "600 watts" of my new pro 600 go into
> making the motor and case hot? Gets pretty warm in about 10 min. What
> is the specific heat of a kitchen aid mixer?
>
> del

pltrgyst wrote:
> On Mon, 06 Feb 2006 15:50:33 +1100, Bill > wrote:
>
> >Sure they do, since Watts is directly converted to horsepower: 749 Watts
> >is 1 horsepower. In the case of a food processor, you'll only have the
> >few % losses in the gearbox to derate it from the advertised wattage to
> >useful work. Given the supply voltage, the current drawn, and the power
> >factor or the load you can work out how much energy is going into that
> >appliance to be converted to useful work.
>
> It's watts of _output_ that may be converted to horsepower; what manufacturers
> provide is watts of _input power consumed_.

Shouldn't consumers insist on manufactureres providing output wattage
and HP? I am really sick of the seller getting away w/o having to
tpovide useful info.

I just don't believe in blind buying things via trial and error.

How much lobbying would it take to get such info printed?


>Not all motors have the same
> efficiency, and efficiency varies over a wide range. Without knowing that
> efficiency, you have no idea how much power a motor is producing.
>
> And then on top of that you've got the drivetrain losses, etc.
>
> -- Larry

In article >,
"Del Cecchi" > wrote:

> If the wire in the windings is small and cheap, you can
> suck a lot of watts that get converted into heat and not output from the
> motor. And if there isn't much steel in the motor, again to save money,
> it might saturate and let the current shoot up and not do much useful
> work. Ever wonder why an immersion blender might say to only run for a
> minute continuous? Or why kitchen aid mixers don't want to be run too
> long continuously? How many of the "600 watts" of my new pro 600 go into
> making the motor and case hot? Gets pretty warm in about 10 min. What
> is the specific heat of a kitchen aid mixer?

Well, its all about being in the general ballpark with kitchen
appliances, because if you are worried about 20% of performance, then
you are probably engineering it too tightly. The variable nature of the
material as well as the variable nature of the processes you are working
with would indicate a higher factor of safety in selecting the right
tool for the job.

The fact that efficiency varies according to a motor's loading and speed
indicates that you are unlikely to be driving it at its most efficient
point of operation anyway.

I agree with most of your points above, but a sheet detailing the
details of the motor's characteristics going to be useless to almost all
customers. Manufacturers may offer 'professional' models with higher use
duty cycles, larger motors, or stronger construction, but even then
there are no guarantees about performance. Thus customers will buy the
'standard' model or the 'professional' model and that's all they
generally want to know (OK, so we know you're not an average customer).

I would agree that labelling with VA (not power) ratings for an
appliance do not accurately tell the purchaser how much useful work you
can get out of an appliance, but it can get you in the ballpark in
comparison against other models of similar appliances. If this is really
important, you should get/measure the torque/speed curves of that
appliance, and match it up with the expected duty cycle for heat
dissipation and then make your decisions based on that. And even then,
the design of that appliance may make it less desirable than another
with a lower useful power output, especially if the other appliance can
make this available power achieve the end result more efficiently.

I fear that this discussion on motor efficiency is a bit like debating
how many angels fit on the head of a pin.

Bill

Bill wrote:
> In article >,
> "Del Cecchi" > wrote:
>
>
>>If the wire in the windings is small and cheap, you can
>>suck a lot of watts that get converted into heat and not output from the
>>motor. And if there isn't much steel in the motor, again to save money,
>>it might saturate and let the current shoot up and not do much useful
>>work. Ever wonder why an immersion blender might say to only run for a
>>minute continuous? Or why kitchen aid mixers don't want to be run too
>>long continuously? How many of the "600 watts" of my new pro 600 go into
>>making the motor and case hot? Gets pretty warm in about 10 min. What
>>is the specific heat of a kitchen aid mixer?
>
>
> Well, its all about being in the general ballpark with kitchen
> appliances, because if you are worried about 20% of performance, then
> you are probably engineering it too tightly. The variable nature of the
> material as well as the variable nature of the processes you are working
> with would indicate a higher factor of safety in selecting the right
> tool for the job.
>
> The fact that efficiency varies according to a motor's loading and speed
> indicates that you are unlikely to be driving it at its most efficient
> point of operation anyway.
>
> I agree with most of your points above, but a sheet detailing the
> details of the motor's characteristics going to be useless to almost all
> customers. Manufacturers may offer 'professional' models with higher use
> duty cycles, larger motors, or stronger construction, but even then
> there are no guarantees about performance. Thus customers will buy the
> 'standard' model or the 'professional' model and that's all they
> generally want to know (OK, so we know you're not an average customer).
>
> I would agree that labelling with VA (not power) ratings for an
> appliance do not accurately tell the purchaser how much useful work you
> can get out of an appliance, but it can get you in the ballpark in
> comparison against other models of similar appliances. If this is really
> important, you should get/measure the torque/speed curves of that
> appliance, and match it up with the expected duty cycle for heat
> dissipation and then make your decisions based on that. And even then,
> the design of that appliance may make it less desirable than another
> with a lower useful power output, especially if the other appliance can
> make this available power achieve the end result more efficiently.
>
> I fear that this discussion on motor efficiency is a bit like debating
> how many angels fit on the head of a pin.
>
> Bill

Hardly. If one reads the Cooks Illustrated mixer test one sees quite a
difference between a 5qt KA and a 5qt Hobart in performance, even though
the wattage is similar. Likewise KA makes a big deal about the 300 watt
vrs the 325 watt vrs the 350 watt.

So watts is not an especially useful measure. If that is what you were
saying above I would agree with that. The whole small appliance spec
business reminds me of cheap stereo equipment. This amp will do 500
watts peak power.

del

--
Del Cecchi
"This post is my own and doesn’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions,
strategies or opinions.”