Maybe you recently planted 2024 cucumbers. Maybe your pre-summer diet made you eat more salads and love them. As temperatures rise, you may have noticed an increase in quality products at your local farmers market. Vegetables can be delicious if you cook them right…but making that happen can feel like a repetitive struggle, even for this kitchenware writer. Luckily, with the right tools, meal prep becomes easy. That's this Full Star Mandolin & Spiral Slicer. The popular vegetable slicer comes with six interchangeable attachments for slicing, julienne, grating, spiraling, ribboning, and more, cutting your time in the kitchen in half. Intrigued? Keep reading for my unbiased review.
Amazon
Play beautiful kitchen music with this mandolin this summer.
$23 on Amazon
Save time (and fingers)
As someone who loves to cook (but hates preparing vegetables), I was very happy to receive a Full Star Mandolin & Spiral Slicer as a Christmas present a few years ago. I had seen similar products online and I was tired of using mandolins, which have sent many cooks to the ER. — This seems to be designed with safety in mind. Not only does it come with protective gloves, it also has a nifty finger guard that you can stick to the vegetables you're slicing, so there's no risk of your hands coming into contact with the blade.
Speaking of blades, the aforementioned six interchangeable attachments include a 3mm and 5mm mandolin, julienne blade, grater blade, spiral cut blade, and ribbon cut blade. Each lid snaps on easily and sits on top of a clear container to neatly store sliced vegetables. So far, I've used everything but the ribbon-cutting blade, and I can say with certainty that I'll never shy away from a veggie-filled recipe again.
All-purpose vegetables
Thanks to the mandolin blade, I was able to make a huge batch of homemade sweet potato chips in minutes and with very little effort. It takes him less than a minute to slice a sweet potato. A thin, uniform disk is always obtained. From there, they're brushed with olive oil and salt and baked in the oven to create a crunchy snack. delicious! You can do the same with beets or carrots. The world is your oyster (mushroom).
Two years ago for Thanksgiving, my husband made sweet potato gratin and hand-sliced the potatoes. No more. We made it again this Thanksgiving using her Fullstar and it took just a fraction of the time. (I know it's a long road to Turkey Day, but I'll say it: The Full Star Slicer is powerful Helper on holiday. )
I recently made “zoodles” (zucchini noodles) for the first time using the spiral cut attachment. I was prepared for the dish to fail, but lo and behold, the first time I cooked it, I was greeted with perfectly shredded vegetables. I sautéed it in a little olive oil and seasonings and added my favorite bottled tomato sauce (Rao's Marinara all the way) for an easy weeknight side dish. Both my husband and I thought it was very tasty, but we didn't go anywhere for weekend pasta night.
The grater attachment is useful for cheese because you don't have to drag the cutting board out. I also used a julienne blade to shred carrots for salad, but once Hanukkah comes around, making latkes will no longer be a problem in my life.
Things to note: Cleaning the attachment is a bit fiddly, but it does come with a mini brush to get into those hard-to-reach grooves. You can put everything in the dishwasher, but I prefer washing and drying the metal blades by hand to keep them from rusting. be careful. They are very sharp (which is why they work so well).
what the public says
Don't just take my word for it. Over 23,000 Amazon customers have also given the Fullstar Mandolin & Spiral Slicer a perfect rating.
“My arthritis makes it hard for me to cut things, so I thought I'd get a mandolin so I don't mess up slicing vegetables,” one 5-star reviewer shared. “It now takes seconds to slice a potato; [used to take] For several minutes, my hand twitched and froze. ”
“Amazing slicer!” exclaimed another impressed shopper. “I'm trying to increase my vegetable intake and this slicer makes it so much easier. It saves me so much time in the kitchen and I get even slices every time. My favorite is the thin mandoline , perfect for plantains and potatoes. Healthy chips, wish I had bought them sooner!
“I was worried it would be flimsy and cheap, but it wasn't!” wrote one final fan. “I mainly use this to make zucchini noodles and it does a great job. The only problem I've had is that the spiral noodle cutter is a little difficult to clean. , that's what happens with this kind of product. I just pop it in the dishwasher and it's fine. ”
Amazon
I have the white, but you can also choose clear, gray, or this sleek black version.
$23 on Amazon
And for chopping? This is also Fullstar's #1 bestseller.
Amazon
Unlike models where you have to keep pulling the string to forget about the vegetables, this gizmo gives you uniform dice all at once. In addition to chopping, it also comes with a spiral blade and a ribbon blade.
$30 on Amazon
“Impressive!” gushed one happy home cook. “This makes cutting small vegetables like baby carrots, onions, and celery a breeze! I'm a senior with arthritis, and this helps speed up my work in the kitchen and helps me with my painful hands. and is very helpful in freeing your fingers from the rigors of manual chopping everything. ”
Of course, if you have Amazon Prime, shipping is free. Not a member yet? No problem. You can sign up for a 30-day free trial here. (By the way, even if you don't have Prime, shipping is free on orders over $25.)
The reviews cited above reflect the latest version at the time of publication.
