blender recommendations

R

Rusk

250+ Posts
I'm thinking of getting a new blender. Right now all I have is some cheap plastic one from Target, and it struggles to meet my blending needs.

Anywho, I don't know much about blenders. What are good brands? What do I need to look for in a blender?

I need it to be able to crush ice well when making margaritas. A good blender for smoothies would be nice, too.

I've just started looking, and have found blenders that claim to be powerful ice crushing machines with anywhere from 300 watt motors to 600 watt motors. How much power is enough?

The 600 watt was 100 bucks, it was a Cuisinart brand. That's a bit steep, but again, I really don't know the range of the types of blenders I will need.

any help with blender recommendations would be great.
 
Kitchen-Aid makes some excellent blenders. Very powerful, heavy duty design (much like their mixers which are awesome). They're not cheap ($100 and up, depending on the model), but if you use your blender with any regularity at all you'll quickly appreciate the extra power & quality.

Definitely get one with a sturdy glass (not plastic) container. Another great feature about our Kitchen-Aid is the buttons are smooth & integrated into the control panel--not the old in/out buttons that are impossible to clean & look disgusting after the first time you use it.
 
A Vita-Mix is the best blender I have ever seen. It costs around the $400.00 range but it is phenomenal. Starbucks, smoothie king, ice cream places, chilis they all use them. It can make homeade ice cream, hot soup, fresh peanut butter anything that your heart desires. I want one so bad I just can't get myself to fork over the $. I have only seen them on the internet and at home and garden shows. Sorry, its not that much help but they are the best.
 
Vita-Mix if you want to go industrial strength. I have a Cuisinart with glass container, smooth buttons, easy to wash. It crushes ice just fine. The one thing I wish is that its base was a bit wider. Sometimes the ice will get stuck until I poke or add more liquids.
 
Ditto on the Kitchen Aid. Just like the blenders, they are about as heavy duty you can get for the money and will crush ice easily at any of the 5 speeds. They are exceptional at making smoothies and frozen drinks.

The Link

Retail is about $130, but I have seen them on sale for less and you can get a reconditioned one at the factory out mall or ebay for much less. They also sell new and refurbished units direct: The Link
 
I went and got that KitchenAid KSB5 at Kohl's. It has a $20 mail in rebate, so that helped.

Hope it works out, seems good.
 
I have the $100 KitchenAid blender. Call me weird, but I only spent that much because I couldn't find a cheaper blender in black (to match the other appliances in my kitchen). It has a great motor, but the blade design is more for blending than chopping. It doesn't crush ice as well as I'd like, leaving small slivers in margaritas/smoothies.
 
I like my Waring as well. If you can get past not having all the functions (it just has high and low) then it's a great blender. Those functions are bogus anyway, at least to me.
 
I have the KitchenAid and the motor, buttons, & blades are all very nice. My only complaint is the smooth round jar. When you get your mix spinning really well, it'll sling everything to the outside and it just spins and spins and spins, but doesn't fall back into the blades. For my next blender, I'm thinking about the new Viking blender... I've heard good things about it and it has a nice clover-leaf shaped jar.
 
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