Relish Elbow...

17 years ago

I just finished fine-dicing the mounds of cukes, red and green peppers, celery, and onions to make what will amount to about 4 pints of pickle relish. :P

Now, the texture and flavor of my home made relish is worth the effort when compared to the insipid stuff they sell at the grocery store.

BUT............

If there were a chopper gadget of some kind that really worked, it would make me a very happy relish maker.

I did try my food processor (as one recipe suggested), but I didn't care for the texture. I like the evenly (well, relatively) chopped dice for both the texture and appearance.

I have one of those choppers that has a basin and a top-knot that one is meant to pound at wildly while a set of blades that look rather like an apple corer/slicer goes up and down and rotates slightly with each pump. Upon trial, the texture of the vegetables was slightly better, but if I had to use that to chop more than a couple of cups of veggies, I'd drive myself to a stroke or worse.

I'm envisioning some sort of apparatus in which I could place a cucumber, or celery stalk, push down a couple of handles to slice, move the veggie (or the handles) and push down again to chop.

If at ALL possible it would be really, really nice if it would be sharp enough for a fairly ripe tomato (salsa) but I'm not holding out for that, lol!

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Comments (11)

trixietx
17 years ago
I couldn't agree more. When I make relish or salsa I do it by hand. I haven't found a machine or gadget yet that I like, the chop is either too big or pulverized.

Would you mind sharing your pickle relish recipe? I make squash relish, but have not found a pickle relish recipe that I really like.
annie1992
17 years ago
Trixie, I agree, salsa must be done by hand. I like thick, chunky salsa and no chopper or food processor has been able to do it the way I like it. It's just me and my trusty knife.

I usually put the vegetables for sweet relish through my old Salad Shooter with the grater blade. Grandma did it with an old food grinder, but that's too "soupy" for me. The food processor turns the stuff to mush far too quickly. The only thing that works is to chop by hand or use that old Salad Shooter. I think it's because it actually does a lousy job of grating, LOL, so it's thick and chunky enough.....

Annie
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antiquesilver
17 years ago
How about the large size dicing disk/blade on a food processor? It might not be perfect, but it shouldn't turn the food to mush like the regular blade. I'm assuming the new Cuisinart's have these; I have an old CuisPro from 1983 with the full set of attachments so I hope I'm not telling you about something that's no longer made.
diinohio
17 years ago
I bought DD a mezzaluna. Maybe that would give you the dice that you want

Usually used for cutting herbs but I think it would work well for chopping vegetables. The one I bought was $10.00 and came with a small wooden chopping block.

Or you could try a mandoline.

Di
lindac
17 years ago
It can be done with a cuisinart....but it takes a gentle and quick hand.....and small batches.
Linda C
Cloud Swift
17 years ago
If a salad shooter grater works, then what about the food processor grating disk or the grater accessory with a KA mixer?

There is a julienne disk for the KA food processor - then you would only have to do the last chop to make the matchsticks into cubes.
annie1992
17 years ago
cloud, the salad shooter doesn't work the same as my food processor, I can control it a bit more and it's a much coarser grate. The food processor makes my juicy cucumbers and onions into kind of a mush.

Now cabbage for sauerkraut? That I do in the food processor.

Annie
User
17 years ago
My SIL and I did a lot of our chopping, especially the onions, in the FP last year, and will do it again this year. I have three sizes of FP, we did the garlic in the smallest one. It saves so much work. It's not hard to pulse a few times to get the onions just right.

This year we are making extra, a lot extra, my DS and his fiance want salsa for all the guests at their wedding next spring!? Everyone will be over for the salsa marathon.
rachelellen
Original Author
17 years ago
I like the idea of the rather savage looking curved blade chopper that Di posted...it rings the bell of the savage in me, I suppose. But, what I really was hoping for was something that would give me the bittie cubes that hand dicing produces, and I've not met a food processor blade yet that does anything closer than a coarse grating.

Jeepers. Maybe I should invent such a tool as I envision and make a mint. :D
mustangs81
17 years ago
I have been holding back my suggestion since it's a ASOTV gadget, but here goes. I love it, it quickly makes uniform pieces, easy to wash, doesn't take up too much space.

Here is a link that might be useful: Dicer
User
17 years ago
I like that, I have a small alligator dicer for garlic, I hadn't thought about big ones, but that might help when we do our salsa marathon - I can get a couple so more than one of us can chop, and then I can give them to the kids for their cooking adventures. My DS and SIL do most of the cooking?!

Relish Elbow...

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