This is a guest post from Jeanie Hooper Reed.
THE LOVE IN MY KITCHEN
In years of yore, long before I was Queen of My Own Kitchen, the scuttle-butt about the homestead kitchen was “VitaMix is a fantastic machine, but way too expensive!” What that expense was, I have no idea; Mom never got one. Fast forward through the years to a phone call from my husband: “I saw a used VitaMix at a garage sale; shall I pick it up?” I seized the opportunity to at least have one sitting on my counter. Then I had to figure out how to use it.
I balked at the idea of spending as much on the VitaMix cookbook as we did on the machine itself, so by trial and error, we learned to make sherbet, grind fresh flour and make pratsche ‘slurry’. We used that old, stainless steel machine for almost 20 years. During that time we replaced lid seals, and found a base unit on eBay for a very reasonable price when the original one finally burned out. Finally the gears just wouldn’t engage anymore, and there was a modest amount of smoking whenever we flipped the switch. Alas, our run appeared to be over.
Conversations pulled up recollections that occasionally, the local warehouse store had VitaMix demonstrations, so it was concluded that the next time we saw the machine demonstrated, we would check it out, and think about buying a new and flashy model.
No more than 2 weeks later, joy upon joy…there they were, whipping up soups and icees for sampling. I turned around and walked right out of the store. No, not to get away from temptation, but to try to be rational and responsible with our somewhat limited discretionary funds.
“Think this through first,” I admonished myself. Oh, I did! Summer was coming. Just think of all the healthy, fruity icees we could enjoy. Yeah. OK. Back into the store I march. Over to the demonstrator. “I want one of these.” Blink. Blink.
“Can I tell you about them?”
“No, I have an old one that has died; I need a new one…now.” Probably his fastest sale ever.
Oh, the bliss! I love cooking up fresh soups in it…takes about 7 minutes. Frozen fruit icees that will give you an instant ‘cold’ headache if you eat them too fast…even less time. Coleslaw for 40 diners? Give me about 3 minutes. Barley left over from a wedding? Grind it up into flour for a wonderful addition to homemade bread. Incredible cashew gravy with no added oils or flour…a couple of minutes. I can’t remember the last time I made a white sauce the old fashioned way. Cashews have taken over that role completely. With the help of the love of my kitchen…the VitaMix.