Quality Mandolin

Infi-del

Infi-del

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Apr 6, 2009
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Looking to buy a Mandolin for the kitchen. I'd like something with different blade shapes for interesting cuts but straight cut would be cool to. I want a good one but don't need anything super dooper like the Kershaw $300.00 affair. No very little about them so some help in finding a good one for a reasonable price would be appreicated.

Thanks.
 
America's Test Kitchen recommended the OXO Good Grips V-Blade Mandoline Slicer, and I bought it on their recommendation. I guess it all depends on what you want it to do. I use my knives for most things, but I find that when making a lot of perfectly uniform slices of crisp things in a hurry, like potatoes for chips, this is a tool that was well worth the money.

Just don't expect it (or any mandoline) to be much good for things like tomatoes. ;)
 
My wife got me one of the OXO ones recently to replace a couple of cheap plastic
Japanese ones that she hated ever after getting pretty badly cut cleaning one.

Can't really say that it's a lot better, but it is good at a reasonable price compared to
the incredibly expensive French ones.

They're a specialized tool for fine even slicing of some vegies. Certainly don't replace
a knife, but a lot easer for, say, reducing some zucchini to pasta like strands.

They're also surprisingly dangerous, it's very easy to really shred your hand when using
or cleaning them.
 
The one I posted above has a guard and spring loaded blade.

The guard has a hole in it for the material you are slicing to pass through.

The blade stays flush with the work surface until the guard passes over.

After the guard covers the blade on a slicing stroke the blade pops up to cut. Then before the guard has uncovered the blade and after the slice the blade pops down.

On my old mandolin I got bit a couple of times. I haven't been bit with this one. I have been using it per instructions and I can't see how you could get cut with it unless you were using it incorrectly.
 
The OXO has a similar guard, but not a spring loaded blade. The problem, in my
experience, is that the guards never work as well as they claim, especially for
the last third or so of the veggie. This leads to careful bare hand use.

Also, cleaning these things really is at least as dangerous as using them. Both
of the people I know who got cut significantly were cleaning the mandolin at the time.

This isn't to say they're bad. I have one and use it when it makes things easier.
Nothing bad to say about the Pampered Chef one either -- I've never seen it so
can't compare it.
 
Dan Pierson said:
The OXO has a similar guard, but not a spring loaded blade. The problem, in my
experience, is that the guards never work as well as they claim, especially for
the last third or so of the veggie. This leads to careful bare hand use.
Click to expand...

You do have to learn how to run the guard across the machine to get the blade to work right. Once you get a rhythm going it works great.

I am not saying the one I posted is the best but it works great for me for the price. I am not a heavy user of a mandoline by any means.

Good Luck
 
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