Yee hah! That was butt kick'n flavor! 4 or 5 large shallots - cut away and discard the husks - thin slice ( very thin ) - coat bottom of pan with olive oil and fry 'til browned - add about 1/2 cup lemon juice and continue to fry till caramelized 2 Habneros Peppers - Thin slice and add to fry pan with other ingredients 20 cloves of garlic - grind up in blender, adding lemon juice to lubricate - pour into fry pan with other ingredients and brown all ingredients for about 2 minutes - pour all ingredients from fry pan into blender 2 sticks of butter ( or more if you prefer ) - cut into pats and toss into blender 1/8 cup cilantro - add to stuff in blender - run blender until all ingedients become nearly liquid. Results should look very similar to dijon mustard, but not taste that way. ( go on! taste it! ) - pour contents of blender into a suitable container with lid that you will later be able to easily spoon out of it. - let cool and refrigerate. - in advance of use, spoon out some of this concoction onto a small dish and let it come to room temperature so you can spread it easily. 1 loaf sour dough bread - preheat oven to 300 degrees. - cut bread lengthwise, splitting top from bottom. - spread the conconction on both halves of bread, split sides ( not on the crust side! ) - place both halves in a pyrex cooking plate, split side up, and cover with a modest amount of mozzarella or other favorite cheese - place in preheated oven and let bake for 7 or 8 minutes - turn oven on low broiler setting and let broil for an additional couple minutes to melt the cheese and the concoction directly from the broiler heat. - Take out, turn off oven, cut into suitable pieces and gobble it up. You can never find garlic butter in the stores. You are forced to buy frozen garlic bread. That so disappointing! But hey, blender to the rescue. Warning: rich in butter! Got enough here to last several days, if not weeks.

It is not you. It's the blender. The behavior of liquid in the blender when you are using it is dependent on the shape of the jar and the fluid dymanics of the blades. You can try bending the blades to modify the dynamic characteristics, which I don't recommend unless you have the confidence of tinkering this sort of things. I have done it with my blender. There is a very practical way you can have the feature that is on very expensive blenders, namely soft-start. Buy a motor(router) speed control from Harborfreight ($20.00). You will be able to vary the speed of your blender from 0 to full, just like soft-start. or any speed in between. No more salad dressing on your ceiling. You can even run your blender at such a low speed that you can cramble eggs. dcarch

"Why buy a new jar?" Because it's cheap. :-) Many jars come with blades. Also, very often after I make a smoothie, I just put the whole jar into the refrigerator, rather than transfer to another container and have to wash the jar. dcarch

I have an old VitaMix w/ reversible motor. I use the reverse function when I grind egg shells into powder. DSII bought a Ninja that he uses for making smoothies. I've only used it a couple of times. It's a Rube Goldberg contraption and is somewhat confusing to assemble the different blades, bowls/ containers. I default to using my old Cuisinart food processor, the Vita Mix or a stick blender. Also have a regular Oster blender--seldom used. Mostly, I use a stick blender or the food processor. I use the bread maker to make yeast & pasta dough. (Super easy clean--just let the leftover dough bits dry & they flake off.) Kitchen Aid mixer is used for making cookies & cakes that need long mix times for creaming butter & sugar. Use a hand mixer for making mashed potatoes.