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Does anyone have/use Vitamix?

L

LIVEFRMNYC

macrumors G3
Original poster
Oct 27, 2009
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I'm thinking about getting a Vitamix. Basically I love drinking fruits & veggies much more than eating them. I'm looking to use this on a daily basis.

Does anyone have one? Is it really that good and worth the money? I looked at comments of Amazon and most are good.
 
mobilehaathi said:
Why? This is not a judgement but a genuine question driven by curiosity.
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It just taste better. My taste for food is pretty unhealthy and it's freaking hard to change my taste, but I've always loved to drink stuff. I actually drink more than I eat. I also find myself drinking fruits and veggies that I probably won't eat much of taste good. Might seem weird, but that's just me.

For example, I love the Naked "Green Machine" drink and the other ones. It contains some things I would hate to eat, like Broccoli. Also love trying new drinks at Juice bars. I rather make my own drinks on a daily basis versus paying a lot for it at a juice bar or dealing with pasteurized bottled stuff.

I'm about to cut ALL unhealthy foods out of my life. So drinking some fruits & veggies would be much easier for me.
 
LIVEFRMNYC said:
It just taste better. My taste for food is pretty unhealthy and it's freaking hard to change my taste, but I've always loved to drink stuff. I actually drink more than I eat. I also find myself drinking fruits and veggies that I probably won't eat much of taste good. Might seem weird, but that's just me.

For example, I love the Naked "Green Machine" drink and the other ones. It contains some things I would hate to eat, like Broccoli. Also love trying new drinks at Juice bars. I rather make my own drinks on a daily basis versus paying a lot for it at a juice bar or dealing with pasteurized bottled stuff.

I'm about to cut ALL unhealthy foods out of my life. So drinking some fruits & veggies would be much easier for me.
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Thanks for sharing. :) Good luck on your quest to cut out unhealthy food; this is not a trivial task for most people in the industrialized world.
 
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I have a Vitamix. It is the most expensive kitchen appliance I have ever bought (apart from the actual stove and fridge), but it is pretty darned cool.

For the first two weeks after I bought it, my wallet was stinging and I tried to justify a return by shopping for cheaper blenders. "If this $100 KitchenAid is just as good, I can return the $500 Vitamix." Well, none of them held up, and I kept the Vitamix.

I did not have access to a Blendtec at the time so I never compared those two, but the prices are pretty comparable anyway and I think it's just a matter of preference.

I use mine mostly in summer for making healthier frozen treats. Freeze up your choice of berries, and sliced bananas, mangoes, etc. Pile it in with a half cup of milk or cream or juice. Blend away until you get "ice cream". Very tasty and no added sugar or fat (if you don't use cream)!

I have also tried blender hummous and soup, with varying degrees of success. In the end, I think I can make those things better with other tools. But as a frozen dessert maker, this thing rocks.

I can see why you'd like it for veggies... one cup of blended veggie juice equals a HUGE pile of leafy green salad.
 
You may want to check out the Nutribullet. I've been eyeballing one of those for a while now. Lots of great reviews, about 1/3 or 1/4 the cost of a Vitamix, though it isn't quite as large/industrial looking.

The Ninja BL660 looks like an interesting option as well.
 
Consumer Reports ranks the Vitamix and Blendtec neck and neck for best blenders, which is not particularly surprising, but one of the Ninja models is ranked just below them. Considering the Ninja blender is a tiny fraction of the cost, it might be worth trying one out. If it works for your needs, you've just saved hundreds of dollars.
 
I have a Blendtec and I love it. I am usually pretty cheap when it comes to things, but I think the high price tag on the Blendtec is totally worth it. I would expect the same for a Vitamix.

P-Worm
 
We have just taken delivery of a Vitamix, but haven't used it yet. Literally - it came yesterday.

We decided on the Vitamix after talking with the owner of the Bliss Cafe (in Victoria BC). I recommend getting her cookbook. One of the 'accessories' we got to go with the Vitamix is an Almond Mylk bag. Essentially a fine mesh bag. You can then sieve some or all of the pulp out - which allows you create different things and different textures.

We're looking forward to experimenting with ours soon.
 
snberk103 said:
We decided on the Vitamix after talking with the owner of the Bliss Cafe (in Victoria BC). I recommend getting her cookbook. One of the 'accessories' we got to go with the Vitamix is an Almond Mylk bag. Essentially a fine mesh bag. You can then sieve some or all of the pulp out - which allows you create different things and different textures.
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Cool. That could be handy for juicing. I discovered I could blend apples -- skin, seeds and all -- and make a tasty cider, except that you need to press out all the foam and pulp.
 
yes

LIVEFRMNYC said:
I'm thinking about getting a Vitamix. Basically I love drinking fruits & veggies much more than eating them. I'm looking to use this on a daily basis.

Does anyone have one? Is it really that good and worth the money? I looked at comments of Amazon and most are good.
Click to expand...

Yes, completely agree with CAptHenryMorgan. We have an older model that kicks ass, even though mom accidentally mangled the blades by leaving a spoon in when creating something some years ago. I think we've had it for at least 4-5 years now. They are warhorses and worth the money imo.

I just started using it earlier this year for raw food experiments. It will serve you very well.
 
Kale is supposed to be one of the harder things to blend and the $70 Ninja does it as good as I can imagine a blender to do. Vitamixes seem more like a pro blender for high volume situations, like at a restaurant, but if you have the money its always nice to have a pro tool, or if you are used to smoothie shop smoothies and can tell the difference in blend quality.
 
zombiecakes said:
Kale is supposed to be one of the harder things to blend and the $70 Ninja does it as good as I can imagine a blender to do. Vitamixes seem more like a pro blender for high volume situations, like at a restaurant, but if you have the money its always nice to have a pro tool, or if you are used to smoothie shop smoothies and can tell the difference in blend quality.
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It is interesting to note that if you peek behind the counter at smoothie places, Orange Julius, Booster Juice, or the places that do "frappes" like Starbucks, virtually all of them will either have Vitamixes or Blendtecs.

I never truly felt the need to buy commercial grade gear but, as I mentioned earlier, when I compared other cheaper blenders, none of them held up. Most of them had plastic gears that interfaced between the motor and the blade, and even within just a few uses you could feel bits of plastic being rubbed away. A few years of use and those plastic gears would be stripped away. The Vitamix gears are all solid metal.
 
Maybe for blending, check out Nutrabullet or whatever it's called. Really great for drinking your fruits and veggies.
 
LIVEFRMNYC said:
I'm thinking about getting a Vitamix. Basically I love drinking fruits & veggies much more than eating them. I'm looking to use this on a daily basis.

Does anyone have one? Is it really that good and worth the money? I looked at comments of Amazon and most are good.
Click to expand...

I have been looking into getting more veggie/green smoothies etc for some time but was shocked to see the very high price for Vitamix. Was impressed by the demo at local Costco, but still wasn't sure forking out a small fortune for a blender. That was 8 months back. I have tried several different blenders and put them to various tasks. Yes, I could have read Consumereports but by nature I am skeptic so embarked on my own research.
Here is a summary:
As many say the real high power blenders are Vitamix and Blendtec. But for many tasks Ninja did a good job for smoothies: fruit as well as veggie. Also the Kitchenaid 5 power blender did a fair job for fresh fruit smoothies but not much power for veggies like kale, cabbage etc. There was one Oster reversible blade one that did a fairly good job at fruit smoothies and some veggies too (except kale and like).

So if someone is mainly interested in smoothies then he/she should buy a cheap one. Most of these lower priced ones will do good job for most veggies.

If you really want super smooth veggies smoothies and a blender that can take any sort of veggies then you got: Vitamix, Blendtec and Ninja.
If you want to make many different sort of recipes: ice cream, soups, peanut/almond butter, almond milk etc etc then it would be Vitamix. Blendtec is a very close second.
Currently I am running tests on Vitamix after trying Blendtec. Blendtec had dissapoiniting results for ice cream. For any thick items: ice cream, peanut butter etc Blendtec was not effective due to poor handling of air pockets that get created just above the blades. for these you will need a separate $129 Blendtec Twister jar.
Vitamix so far has passed all tests. This is because it is all manual and you will have to use the Tamper bar to remove air pockets for thick items. Blendtec is all automatic and you just need to push the button. It has manual buttons too, but again I don't consider them as really manual.
Personally I really wanted to keep the Blendtec as it is sleek, most tasks are automated, makes excellent smoothies and yes it fits under the kitchen cabinet. Who knows may be I'll finally end up with a Blendtec if Vitamix fails in some tasks. My tests are still ongoing.
 
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Get it and never look back.

Best blender you can buy. Period. Had one that lasted 20 years and then bought a new one last year. Professional blender that is absolutely amazing. A little advice: all machines have the exact motor ($449 is same as $649) the price difference is the accessories you can add. And don't buy from Williams and Somona, they jack the prices up $150 and make you think your getting a good deal. I bought my 2012 machine refurbished from vitamix and it works perfectly fine.
 
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Last night I made a delicious mango sorbet using nothing but frozen mango chunks and a splash of orange juice. The machine made some complainy sounds but in the end it came out perfectly smooth and ice-cream like.

Then I cleaned the jar and poured in a can of roasted peanuts, and made my own peanut butter. Yum! No oil or any other ingredients needed, just peanuts.

I really need to use this thing more often!
 
Great product, I've had mine for about 10 yrs and still running strong. Well worth the $$$.
 
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chanman said:
A little advice: all machines have the exact motor ($449 is same as $649) the price difference is the accessories you can add. And don't buy from Williams and Somona, they jack the prices up $150 and make you think your getting a good deal.
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Appreciate that info. I made up my mind to go with Vitamix. I was close to getting a Blentec cause it looked nicer and more modern, until I read a review about manual vs automatic settings.
 
I have a blentec, which pretty much does the same thing.
We used it a lot (few times a day) the first couple months we got it, but now we don't use it as much (few times a month).
 
I've had the Vitamix 5200 for a few years now and absolutely love it. I seriously use it almost every day. It has never let me down... it really is an impressive machine.

They're expensive but, in my opinion, totally worth it. They come with a 7 year warranty too, which helped me justify the cost. If you're looking to save some money though, look into a refurbished model directly from the factory for $100+ less. You can also get free shipping with a promotion code from an online affiliate like http://rawblends.com/vitamix-blender
 
I am saving up for a Vitamix as well. From everything I have read, they are the top of the line and as mentioned above, you will see them in commercial settings where blending is done constantly.

Reading about the latest models online, the differences between models were not clear to me. I created this page to compare them:

http://www.squidoo.com/vitamix-7500-vs-750

Blendtec is a close second and a Ninja model has received high marks lately. You probably won't go wrong with any of these.
 
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