I was given a deluxe kitchen aid immersion blender for Christmas. The deluxe one has extra attachments, like a mini chopper, is very powerful and because of size, more convenient than hauling out the the big processor or blender. My daughter loves it for smoothies. And, its easy to clean. I don't know the price (gift).

I also have the KA that carolml does, but be aware that the blade is a little above the bottom in the chopper attachment, so it's not so useful for small amounts of nuts or herbs because it spins above them.

The blender part works fine for everything I've asked it to do, but I'm not sure it's worth buying the fancy kit, although the storage bag is nice to have.

I love mine, and use the mini chopper all the time.

I use it for mixing up stuff in the pot and it sure works better than putting someting in the blender and having it cavitate and you have to keep pulsing to get anything done.

Mine is a quesinart - got that one because that was what was on sale at the time.

Hi- I also love my kitchenaid immersion blender. The mini food processor is AMAZING! I use it all the time when I am not feeling like pulling out my monster Food Processor.

Here is a link that might be useful: KA Immersion Blender

Love my Bamix! It is so great for blending soups in the pot. I used to have another brand (I don't remember which one) and to be honest I don't know if there is a big difference btwn brands. It is such a great kitchen tool.

I have a Cuisinart SmartStick and love it. I use it mostly for soups and smoothies, it rocks. I especially like that it separates the blade from the motor end for easy cleaning and storage.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cuisinart SmartStick

I've been wondering about these too. I'm not quite sure how they work. We do a lot of fruit smoothies and ice cream milk shakes in our house, made now in the blender. But I'm not crazy about leaving the blender out all the time and I'll hear loud complaints from my son if I attempt to put it away in a cabinet. Is an immersion blender strong enough to chop up ice in a smoothie or handle a thick ice cream shake?

And stupid questions: Do you just put the fruit in the glass and immerse the blender in it to make a smoothies? Or do you still need to use a larger container?

> Is an immersion blender strong enough to chop up ice in a smoothie or handle a thick ice cream shake?

Yes, plenty strong enough. I usually use the container that came with the blender, since I usually make more than one serving at a time. It has a cap so I can just stick the extra in the fridge for next time.

I love mine (not made any more). It was cheap and is very light weight. A number of people are unhappy with the multi-speed and superstrong ones because they're very heavy.

It's worth shopping around and trying how they feel in your hand, etc.

Another feature that is good on mine, but I've heard isn't so good on some is the mini-chopper attachment. The blades have to be close to the floor of the chopping bowl for it to work really well for things like herbs.

Mine is a hand-me down Braun. It seems rather light-duty, but even this one works fine for soups and sauces. I have the mini-chopper for the immersion blender but never use it. Easier to pull out the Cusinart mini-chopper machine - it doesn't fall over when left unattended.

On my stand blender, I sharpen the blades. I don't dare do so with the immersion blender, that seems like a disadvantage.

I'm using a Braun that I bought about 20 years ago. I can't imagine how much soup and tomato sauce have passed through those blades. I love it and can't do without it.

Braun is the one I mentioned isn't available any more. It's a great little device, alas.

I also have the Cuisinart and love it. it's so perfect for pureeing soups and sauces right in the pot :)

We like a lot of low-fat pureed soups. I was sick of pouring hot liquid into either the Cuisinart of the blender and having so much to clean up.

Catmom and I hit the W-S outlet and I went for a Bamix 20% off, after reading all the reviews. It's a superb tool, ergonomically good and very easy to use. Purees 3-4 quarts of soup right in the pot in about 40 seconds.

I've had so much kitchen equipment for so long I rarely buy anything new -- usually I'm trying to get rid of something. This has been a stellar purchase, right up there with my little Kuhn knives and C&B fleximats.

We have two, the Cuisinart with attachments and the Bamix. (We had to use up a credit at Williams-Sonoma by a deadline and couldn't figure out what else to get, so I decided to give the Bamix a spin.)

I like both, but for different reasons---and much to my husband's dismay, decided they weren't really replacements for one another.

I've had the Cuisinart for a decade, and I love-love-love it. I don't use the mini-food processor attachment, but use both the immersion blender and the whisk attachment regularly. We have a stand mixer but no other hand mixer. My husband's big pet peeve about the Cuisinart is that it splatters things everywhere, and one thing I don't like about it is that things get stuck in the blade, so the Bamix looked like it might solve those.

Some differences
- Bamix has teeny tiny little blades so they are very easy to clean, but also easy to lose
- Bamix does not seem to splatter as much as the Cuisinart, especially with soup and such things.
- Not much gets caught in the Bamix blades, whereas with the Cuisinart, for some foods I have to keep stopping it and freeing the blade.
- I have not successfully gotten the Bamix to whip egg whites, though it says it will do this (tried all the attachments!) The Cuisinart does this in a heartbeat (but there will often be bits of egg white on the wall...)
- Bamix is a pain to clean overall because you must unplug the entire mixer and bring it to the sink to wash---it's all one piece. The Cuisinart, in contrast, lets you pop off both the whisk and the blending attachments and wash them individually. I almost never take the actual motor/plug piece anywhere near the sink.
- I find the Cuisinart more comfortable to hold, but I suspect that's a personal thing.
- Bamix is slightly easier to store because it has less bulky attachments, but I've never had a problem storing either.
- Cuisinart whisk does a better job with small quantities than Bamix whipping attachment---Bamix seems to need a critical mass of liquid to get into its stride.

So I think either could work...Cuisinart is half the price so I might pick that, but there are things I like better with the Bamix, too. (I'd intended to re-home the Cuisinart but changed my mind since it's still the better tool for some things.) I think the Cuisinart is quite similar to the KA and the Braun, too. For me, these replace both a blender (we have one but haven't used it in years---only rarely makes an appearance for frozen drinks) and a hand mixer, which I really don't miss. My favorite thing about our new kitchen is that we had the wiring on our 1950s stove fixed, so it now has an electrical outlet right in between the burners---perfectly positioned for the immersion blender!

I also have the Bamix and use it frequently for soups and tomato sauce. It is vastly superior to the Cuisinart I owned previously. Look for one with a shaft that's long enough to keep the motor/handle assembly out of the pot.

Bamix all the way. LOVE LOVE LOVE mine.

I broke two in roughly the same spot before I moved on to the Bamix.

The first was an ultra-cheap Oster, which we bought just to see if I liked having one. I really, really did, and since it was only $20, I wasn't that upset when the plastic housing that attached the metal stem/blade to the motor cracked (meaning that it would no longer stay attached to the motor). That took about a year, I think.

The next was a Cuisinart from Costco. It didn't work any better than the Oster, but looked nicer and was about $50. Well, I found out the hard way that you can click the stem/blade to the motor without getting the gears aligned correctly (even though it looked right on the outside). By the time I even realized the blade wasn't spinning, the plastic gears were ground off. That one took months to kill.

At that point, I went for the Bamix since the blades attach to the stem rather than the motor. It was expensive, but it's still going strong three years later. We use the food processor attachment (there's one for wet and one for dry) to grind flour and make almond butter with frozen almonds. I tried using it on ice for a smoothie- it made a snow cone out of a dozen ice cubes in under 30 seconds, but we mostly use the blender because you can make a pitcher at a time.

I have had a Braun for several years and love it! I cannot imagine making soups and sauces without it.It has the mini chopper attachment and I use that fairly often too. I am sorry to hear that they don't make it anymore. I hope mine lasts a long time!

Braun here - and it's a bummer to hear that it's no longer avail. Fortunately I have a spare from when we had two places.

I have used it to puree gallons and gallons of soup right in the pot. For making shakes and smoothies, I use a straight-sided pint canning jar. I also have the whisk attachment, which I use to make very small amounts of fresh whipped cream in a one-cup straight sided canning jar. You can also make mayo with it.

When my poor old kitty had kidney failure he lived for a long time on whipped/pureed cat food that we buzzed up in a canning jar. That was great because we could offer him tiny amounts of food from the container, then return the extra to the fridge with a lid on it.

No matter what brand you buy, I would try to get one where the business end can be disconnected from the power end so you can just wash the blender/whisk in the DW or sink.

L

Wow, thanks for all the responses. I think a Bamix is going on my short list for "Christmas" (in July).

My daughter who lives in small quarters asked for an immersion blender with attachments for Christmas; found one on internet and had it shipped sight unseen. She really likes it and is enjoying the attachments also. And adventurous cook. Kitchenaid, roughly $80 plus shipping if I remember correctly.

I also have the KA, and use it a lot. It's particularly useful because of the variable speeds, a feature that was missing from my old Braun (which lives on - gave it to my mom) I was very tempted by the Bamix, but decided against it because the shaft is not removable from the motor, and therefore not dishwasher safe. I'd go nuts if I had to wash the immersion blender by hand, it gets soup, dressing, etc. all over it.