Meat Grinders

[AzOr]

Ok so I finally got around to breaking it in.

I grinded about 20lbs of meat. About 7lbs from a brisket that I’ll use as hamburger meat and the rest was a pork butt that I split in two for brats and Italian sausage.

Here are some initial thoughts;
-it comes w two grinding plates, a 4.5 and 10mm. It seems like there should be a middle sized plate. I ground everything twice. For the sausage I did half w fine plate and the other half through the 10mm for a variety of texture.
-this thing grinds faster than I can load the hopper. It’s so powerful that I ended up grinding some of the meat that was still pretty frozen. No trouble at all. At one point I left the grinder on while I was cleaning stuff and the motor never got hot. It was barely warmer than room temp.
-cleaning is about what I expected and not much more difficult than my kitchen aid, just bigger parts.
-that big steering wheel looking lock ring is great. Even with greasy hands I could easily change out the plates.

I’m very pleased with it and would recommend this brand- kinda.
When I placed my order I immediately received an email with the order # etc. 8 days went by and I hadn’t heard anything so I called their customer service and they were apologetic and said I’ll be receiving a tracking # and email shortly, which I did. The next day it arrived.
Two weeks after I got the grinder, I get an email stating it was arriving shortly.
A little annoying but I can look past it especially since I’m so happy with the grinder.

 

[AzOr]

Both the brats and Italian sausage came out great.
I need to eat sausage and peppers more often.

Both recipes were from the Marianski book. Their recipes are old school and proven. I can’t wait to try more from their book.

I need more practice when it comes to casing. Oh well, even the mistakes taste great.
For some reason my sausages always curve. No big deal. It’s fine. I’m not self conscious about it or anything.

 

[passedpawn]

Both the brats and Italian sausage came out great.
I need to eat sausage and peppers more often.

Both recipes were from the Marianski book. Their recipes are old school and proven. I can’t wait to try more from their book.

I need more practice when it comes to casing. Oh well, even the mistakes taste great.
For some reason my sausages always curve. No big deal. It’s fine. I’m not self conscious about it or anything.
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Nothing better than sausage chunks and pinapple chunks skewered and grilled. Sausage and pinapple are a great combo.

 

[AzOr]

Nothing better than sausage chunks and pinapple chunks skewered and grilled. Sausage and pinapple are a great combo.

That sounds delicious. I’ll have to give that a shot. Grilled pineapple is underrated. The only recipe I know of is huli huli chicken. This gives me another excuse to grill piñas.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

Anyone know anything about this one? $159 for 1HP...

https://www.costco.com/Weston-Electric-Meat-Grinder.product.1469143.html

 

[Jonakr]

If I kill that thing, my wife will be getting a new one immediately, in the color of her choice.

She's already told me so



Are you actually a homebrewer? Don't you know that overkill is the only acceptable kind of kill?

I'd love to get a nice big meat slicer that will have no trouble for bacon. You know, a 12" Waring from a failed restaurant or Jersey Mike's or something. That I would literally use only a couple of times a year, and have literally NOWHERE to store (which is probably the reason I haven't bought one).

I want the stuff that my grandchildren (who haven't been born yet) will be able to use

"Our" Kitchen Aid is mine. I got it as a birthday present when we found we'd need to do a lot of cooking at home, and is over 20 years old. I still tease my wife that she keeps calling it "hers". She uses it regularly, I use it sparingly.

We've done 4-5 batches of sausage, but would just buy a new KA if we kill this one.

 

[bailey mountain brewer]

Anyone know anything about this one? $159 for 1HP...

https://www.costco.com/Weston-Electric-Meat-Grinder.product.1469143.html

Can't say that I do, but most 1hp grinders go for well over 500 so I'd be a little skeptical. My BIL and I were talking about grinders last night he's looking at a "meat" brand and I think their 3/4 hp was $479 .. not that a higher price means anything and it depends on usage as well, so if your grinding 100lbs vs 20lbs that can help determine your price point. I have a LEM big bite #12 and the thing is an absolute beast, I've but several hundred lbs of venison through and it works like a charm.. so if your gonna do high quantity I'd look at high quality, if your just grinding some here and there, go for it, I'd imagine it has a warranty if it were to crap out, I think Costco is decent at handling that kinda stuff.

 

[AzOr]

The biggest difference in those prices are the materials of the auger, blades, throat (?). The higher price gets you stainless steel as opposed to aluminum. Those pieces are the only pieces to touch your meat.
I paid a higher price for a Meat brand 3/4 hp grinder with stainless parts (LEM and others brands will sometimes offer both).

Because I plan on keeping this thing forever, I didn’t want to gamble on potentially cheap aluminum that sometimes develops a weird chalky feel. Especially when run through a dishwasher. I have had good luck w aluminum utensils in the past though.

Overall, I’m very pleased w my grinder. If I were to do it again, I may opt for a 1/2hp. The 3/4 is a beast. It weighs close to 40lbs. Just the auger alone was close to 3 lbs.

I’ve heard that most companies will run really good Black Friday deals.

 

[AzOr]

Forgot to mention-
When I was obsessing over grinders, I came across several reviews of less expensive units where the users claimed that the throats and augers would streak their meat (no jokes allowed) with a gray color. Not sure if that’s aluminum or some crazy cheap metal mix. I’m not a metallurgist.

 

[OleBrewing]

aluminum and salts don't get along when together for a period of time. if grinding for a multi day session i like to put the grinder head in the freezer instead of breaking it down even then the salts still reacted a little with an aluminum auger.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

I was looking at the reviews of the Costco one. I was having trouble last night seeing it in the app so waited until this morning to look at them on a laptop. The reviews are pretty terrible... So I'm going to stick with my KitchenAid grinder attachment for now.

$159 is cheap enough for as little grinding as I do, but I don't want to buy a piece of crap. So if I end up going with a grinder I'll spend up for a decent one.

 

[AzOr]

I was looking at the reviews of the Costco one. I was having trouble last night seeing it in the app so waited until this morning to look at them on a laptop. The reviews are pretty terrible... So I'm going to stick with my KitchenAid grinder attachment for now.

$159 is cheap enough for as little grinding as I do, but I don't want to buy a piece of crap. So if I end up going with a grinder I'll spend up for a decent one.

Watch Black Friday deals for LEM and MEAT brands. Just make sure that they are the stainless models.

 

[z-bob]

Anyone know anything about this one? $159 for 1HP...

https://www.costco.com/Weston-Electric-Meat-Grinder.product.1469143.html

Not that specific one, but I have a #12 grinder that I bought from Northern Tool (formerly Northern Hydraulic) a few years ago for $99 that looks just about the same. It will rip through a whole beef brisket or a couple of pork shoulders in just a few minutes. The plates from my ancient Chop Rite #10 manual grinder fit it just fine but the knives are a little different. I haven't tried using it for stuffing sausage.

My brother has a LEM #8 grinder and it's about as fast as my lighter-duty #12, but I think with his you have to cut the pieces a little smaller.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

Thanks @z-bob -- For now I'll stick with the KitchenAid. If I start getting into a LOT more grinding (i.e. sausage), I'll have to look into something more powerful.

I was just thinking if this was cheap enough and decent quality, it might be something on my Christmas list because my wife never knows what to get me... I buy anything I need lol ;-)

 

[AzOr]

MEAT is running Black Friday sale now.
https://www.meatyourmaker.com/sale/