8: Our Absolute Favorite Kitchen Tool For Whole Food Plant Based Living

Jarrod: 0:58

In doing a whole food plant based lifestyle, obviously there are a number of tools that we use. But people ask us, what is your number one most favorite go to tool in the kitchen. And in the case of this one, this is even one that we love so much, we'll take it on vacation with us. If you stick around till the very end, we will tell you how to make this tool last longer, which will make it a much better investment. This is episode number eight.

Anita: 1:26

You're listening to the smarter Healthy Living podcast where we firmly believe that getting healthy should never feel like torture, where your host Jarrod and Anita resell. Were college sweethearts and health professionals who help you redefine what getting healthy looks like using a whole food plant based lifestyle. It's time to hear from the experts and learn the best tips and tricks that helped others get beyond the overwhelm to create a vibrant life they love. If you're sick and tired of being sick, and tired, you're in the right place. So pull up a virtual chair, grab your matcha latte, and let's get started. Hi, friends, we're glad you're joining us today, we are going to share with you our favorite kitchen appliance because we know that these are the things we wish we had known to make things simpler when we first started out.

Jarrod: 2:14

This is one of those things that if we were on a deserted island, deserted island with electricity, mind you. And that may have been a little bit of a hint as to what our favorite tool is.

Anita: 2:25

I want to be on that island. You know what I'm saying? That's where I want to get shipwrecked.

Jarrod: 2:29

But this would be that one essential item that we must

Anita: 2:30

And why do we do that? Because we use it for almost have. And like I've said before we even take this with us on any kind of vacation that we've gone. everything.

Jarrod: 2:43

Now we'll make one correction. What we did not take it to China with us. Oh yeah, that's the only one we're

Anita: 2:48

not sure what made it through airport security. What do you think?

Jarrod: 2:51

I would not want to have to explain that to Customs. But apart from that we take it with us everywhere.

Anita: 2:56

Yeah, absolutely love this thing. I make sauces, stews, smoothies, shakes, ice cream, nut milks, pancake and waffle batter. What else? matcha lattes? Oh, this drink. I'm drinking right now. I wish you were here to share this. It's net better with chocolate. It's kick cow. And it tastes like a racist cat. So we love this machine.

Jarrod: 3:20

Okay, this is starting to sound like the Swiss Army Knife of tools it is. So what we're gonna do, we're gonna just do a little drum roll and then you tell us what this is? We got...

Anita: 3:35

It is the Vitamix?

Jarrod: 3:39

*Pow* Yes, it is our Vitamix.

Anita: 3:41

Now, we love our Vitamix. Now, before you freak out thinking those are so expensive. I know what you're thinking. And they are. But this is why it's worth it. And we have another option for you as well. So don't go anywhere. All right, you need a high speed blender, something that'll make your food. If you're making sauces, you don't want nut chunk or chunk of bean in herself. It's unless it's a beanie sauce, right? So you really gotta have something to smooth it out and make it good. And like we were talking about if you haven't had a chance, again, in episode number five to listen to that. Go back and catch episode number five, where we talk about making nut milk, people think it needs to be this big, difficult thing. But if you have a machine like this, that can make things smooth, there's no reason that you can't without an incredible net milk in what two minutes or less. I mean, it's really, really easy. And the Vitamix has just been it's been a game changer for us when we were first married. Right? And well, we really didn't have one then actually it was when Madeline was born. I wish I'd had one when we were first married.

Jarrod: 4:49

It was about 16 years ago, we had gotten it to be able to make baby food.

Anita: 4:53

And how many have we had to buy since then?

Jarrod: 4:56

Just one.

Anita: 4:57

Yeah, that's not not one since, it was just the original that we still own the original Vitamix that we bought.

Jarrod: 5:03

And, it's still going just as strong as a day we bought it. So really, it's a little bit pricey. And it depends on the model that you get. Some are a little bit more than the others.

Anita: 5:12

But I've got to say right here, when we when we had Madeline when we first had her and we were making her baby food, not only were we getting really better quality in there, and she was getting to eat a lot of the things that we ate. So it just made things very easy for us. We make the baby food, I could freeze it in these ice cube trays, and just put it in some kind of reusable freezer bag. And then you can just take the ice cubes out as she needed them and let them thaw and it was it was great. You know, if we needed something on the go, I would use those. So it was just as convenient as buying it in the jar in a baby food jar. But we knew she was getting really great quality. And it was just easy to do.

Jarrod: 5:51

But we also noticed that it tasted better,

Anita: 5:54

But I wanted to think about oh yeah, it was good.

Jarrod: 5:57

It tasted better than that. store bought baby food.

Anita: 6:00

But you got to think about the money saved us. So we're talking about a machine that's really expensive. This lasted us. I mean, in our opinion, it's not up front. Yes. But if you look at how long it lasts, but all the things we were able to do with it, I mean, we made all her baby food, that thing was on every day probably for 16 years. And it was, it saved us all that money because it was so much cheaper to make our meals that way than it was to buy the premade baby food and the packages. And we still did that maybe maybe once or twice when we were traveling or something if we just needed something quick. But

Jarrod: 6:35

She wasn't the only child. We used it for, too, because we had Matthew,

Anita: 6:38

Exactly. Andrew and Kate came home, yeah.

Jarrod: 6:42

We did it for that. But with the initial investment, you have to look at how for how many years have we had it? If you divide that, then it's extremely reasonable. And, we've not had to have the bass repaired, replaced anything like that. Now, we have had a couple of replacements. Now the container that comes with it, it lasts a good long time.

Anita: 7:06

Absolutely.

Jarrod: 7:08

If it's not if it does not succumb to the effect of gravity.

Anita: 7:13

Yeah, so you remember how we like to take it with us everywhere? Well, there was this retreat a couple of years back. Yes, we went to this conference, we took the family and of course, the handy dandy trusty Vitamix with us to the conference. So we we were staying in basically the standard hotel room. I think it had two different it was standard, but it had two different sections where the kids were able to stay as well. So we took that with this, and just in that little kitchenette area where you have a tiny little fridge and we were able to make several things in there. So we come back to the room with something that we wanted to eat. And then

Jarrod: 7:47

We have smoothie soup. I mean, they're a lot of different options. But when we we had everything packed in the back of the vehicle and

Anita: 7:54

When we were leaving, right? Yeah, we were leaving.

Jarrod: 7:57

Were we leaving?

Anita: 7:58

We were absolutely leaving because we were walking out the kids in our walking up. We were just getting everything put in everything.

Jarrod: 8:04

I think I had to open the door back up. So we had to back something else back in. And the parking garage was a little bit of an incline and then boom it came tumbling out.

Anita: 8:15

And, I hear "ching, ching ching," and I look up and there it goes rolling across the parking garage floor. Yeah, in pieces.

Jarrod: 8:22

The good news is that those are replaceable, you can purchase those again, so it's not as much of an investment.

Anita: 8:28

Yeah, so we got that one. And then the next thing that happened is I got online and had this brilliant idea to try making nut butter at home, in my Vitamix, which I'd seen, you know, a famous YouTuber do and so I thought, oh, great idea. Not so great. So, what happened was the Vitamix ended up even though I turned it off when it was warming up, it ended up warping the bottom of it where the blade attached. And so food started leaking through it and we had because it was warped, we had to replace it, which not to go too much off topic. But I want you guys to know if you want to make nut butter at home, there is a way to do it. And we'll talk about that later with another one of our favorite appliances. But on this episode... stay on task... because, I can I can talk plant based all day. Can you Jarrod, can you talk whole food plant based

Jarrod: 9:12

For hours.

Anita: 9:12

Yeah, we love it. So we'll talk about that in another episode. But But right now, just to stick with the Vitamix, yeah, broke. So we got another one. And then it warped with that and what we learned. Let's see, after that, we decided to get a different type because now they have a new type out that's stainless steel, right?

Jarrod: 9:29

It's stainless steel and it is waterproof, you can actually even stick it in the dishwasher. I'm not sure that we would do that

Anita: 9:36

We never have.

Jarrod: 9:38

A lot of that's just for longevity reasons.

Anita: 9:41

But we love it. And the reason is, it's stainless steel through and through. I mean it's amazing. So, you know, I mentioned that we make soups in it. And one of the nice things is with a Vitamix, it goes so quickly because the motors so powerful, what happens is it will heat your soup in the Vitamix, you didn't even have to put it on the stovetop if you don't want to

Jarrod: 10:05

No. And, what we have heard is that if you take room temperature water and blend it for three minutes, it's supposed to bring it up to boiling. We've never tested that. But we know that in making these soups, it will actually heat it for you.

Anita: 10:16

Yeah, and the thing about that is if you're using the standard container, which is a plastic, yes, it's a safer plastic, supposedly it's BPA free. But what we prefer is having it in stainless, we're not telling you you have to buy the stainless we're just telling you, we have loved having the stainless one, it is fantastic. And that's an option that you need to know about when you purchase it as well. But there is another option. If you really want something you want a blender you start this journey and you think, you know, I'm just not willing to invest that much money at all.

Jarrod: 10:49

Or, maybe you just can't.

Anita: 10:50

Yeah.

Jarrod: 10:51

Just cannot.

Anita: 10:52

And so what you might want to look at is another one that we also own and we love it and Let me tell you, when I research something, I research it down to the bone.

Jarrod: 11:03

No stones left unturned.

Anita: 11:04

Yeah. So you're you know that if I'm buying something, and I've been tested it out that it's going to be a good product, and the one that we recommend right now, that's out is the NutriBullet pro 900. Now, I'm not vouching for all new triplets, because in testing people found that not all of them worked quite as well as this one. But I love the NutriBullet pro 900, it blends everything very smooth. If you blend it long enough, it's just not as large of a container, it's more of like a single serve, or maybe something you could share with someone else, you remember how many ounces it is, I can't remember, but it has a shorter container that will make something like a small batch of sauce, maybe, maybe a one cup. And then the other one, I think probably is around a two cups, something like that. So it is wonderful, and it has a little attachment that you can put on it, that will close it. And then it has another one that you can actually drink from the container, I just prefer not to.

Jarrod: 11:57

Flip lid. And there's an attachment where you can put a handle and drink from it like a cup.

Anita: 12:01

But it's really convenient. for single serve, for smaller families. We just use the large Vitamix so much because we have six people.

Jarrod: 12:09

Six of us. But I'll tell you where it comes in handy too is in smaller volumes, because when you have that two quart, or in the case of the stainless steel, it's about a quart and a half, when you're dealing with one or two cups, it may not blend as well, because it just kind of shoots it up the container,

Anita: 12:23

and then you've got the big container to wash. Whereas

Jarrod: 12:26

With the Nutribullet, when Anita's making some the Nutribullet dressings or a sauce of some sort is

Anita: 12:31

I reach for it.

Jarrod: 12:32

And it needs to be one or two cups, this actually works better. It's been a very great add on to, to our kitchen tools,

Anita: 12:40

I'll tell you what's not so great about it is that we reached a point for a while where we thought, Oh, we hate this thing. We don't like it. And what happened was the children were making their own. And we weren't really watching closely enough. And it has these little tabs on it that are plastic that engage it into the base. And I think what they were doing is turning it before they press down and you have to press down to engage it.

Jarrod: 13:04

And then it's actually those plastic tabs that when it engages it turns it on.

Anita: 13:09

Right. And so the plastic tab started breaking off, and then it wouldn't start. And so that was an issue for sure. Ones that we had to order. And we were able to find containers very easily and reorder those and they weren't very expensive. But we just thought if these things are gonna break off every What was it like six weeks, or maybe

Jarrod: 13:27

Yeah, two to three months, somewhere in that timeframe, it was a very long, and we were very disappointed. Come to find out it wasn't the device ,it was user error.

Anita: 13:38

But I imagine that even when you're using it the right way over time, those are going to wear down to their little tiny plastic pieces. So you just don't buy it and expect it to last 16 years, and you're most likely going to be very happy with it.

Jarrod: 13:49

And I think we got the replacements for around, the replacement containers for about$20-$25. They were really recently it wasn't expensive

Anita: 13:56

And the units well below 100. Usually you can find it on sale somewhere or use a coupon it's

Jarrod: 14:02

We've seen as low as around $60, something like that. Very affordable for most people.

Anita: 14:08

Yeah, and since we've been using it just on our end, and the children haven't been using it as much they're using the Vitamix a lot. And they really do a lot of their cooking just because it's what we do is so easy, they can do that on their own for certain meals. But since we've been doing that with the NutriBullet and making it ourselves just using it for ourselves, the plastic pieces have not broken off.

Jarrod: 14:31

It's really good I hadn't at all any sign of wear, though.

Anita: 14:35

So it's a great unit, we highly recommend the NutriBullet pro 900. If you can't do the Vitamix, the Vitamix we have is just a standard, no frills, it has a one flip button to do the high speed and then it has a little bit of variation

Jarrod: 14:49

of a variable dial and it has an on off switch. So it's the 520. And that's the one that runs about $400. They do have some automated models that run$600-$700. But we just the one we've had just tried and true, they still make it and that's the one that we recommend.

Anita: 15:06

So all that to say there are some really great options no matter the price point you're looking for that can last and can work for you for quite a while even natureboy I think it's going to last quite a while probably not 16 years. I don't expect that from it. It's a smaller motor. It's a smaller unit, but it's it's holding up great.

Jarrod: 15:24

It'll definitely be a good investment and get your money's worth.

Anita: 15:27

So we highly recommend that

Jarrod: 15:29

So, this brings us to something that we've learned the hard way that you can do to make this last a lot longer. What we had noticed early on also with the the NutriBullet. Yeah, what was the Nutribullet that it started leaking on the bottom where the blade is. And we thought this was just a poor design, got frustrated with it, and then replaced it. I believe that happened again. Then, then with the Vitamix, we had to replace the carafe and got a new blade with it. And lo and behold about three months later, same thing happened with that

Anita: 16:10

It started leaking out start automating the

Jarrod: 16:12

blade is and it's the the lubricant within it was coming out and it was just making a mess. It was just it was terrible.

Anita: 16:18

And this black goo as long as like oil on the bottom. So we're the blight part is the part that you put Well, with the Vitamix, you don't put it on, but with the NutriBullet, you have to screw that part on. And so the part with the blade, and regardless of which machine is underneath, on the bottom side underneath the blade, it would get goopy and oily,

Jarrod: 16:38

And it would leak out. And what we've learned through contacting Vitamix about this particular part is that we were getting it wet.

Anita: 16:47

So even if it gets really splashed well, like when the kids are washing it or we're washing it and just not thinking about it or sitting it down on the counter. And maybe it's sitting in a little bit of water. When that part gets wet. Eventually,

Jarrod: 16:59

it gets into the inside mechanism and it messes up that lubricant and gets all gummy and really with especially the NutriBullet. We were setting it inside of the sink and it was staying in standing water. And that was a big no no,

Anita: 17:13

But, we weren't putting it in like sink water and sitting it in the water.

Jarrod: 17:17

Like if it were inside another like a casserole or something or get splashed. But since we've learned that we and that was six months, a year ago, it's been a while. We've avoided that we've been very careful with cleaning it and we haven't had a single bit of trouble. Not had one recurrence of that

Anita: 17:34

Right well and the stainless steel don't have that problem. So if you buy the stainless steel carafe with the Vitamix,

Jarrod: 17:40

Because they're made to go in the dishwasher, they're completely waterproof, it does not have that same issue, which is another reason why we love it.

Anita: 17:47

So there are some really great options here for you. This we recommend highly a blender, there are other Blender recommendations that people swear by. But I've tried a lot of them and I found them to leave things chunky and I just when I have a green smoothie, I don't want to green chunky and when I need smooth sauces, I don't want chunks of nuts or anything in that I want it smooth, right

Jarrod: 18:11

Nut milks or the frappuccinos that you make.

Anita: 18:15

So if you're looking for something that's purees things smooth, makes it quick, simple, it's a no brainer. These two machines are the things you need to get. Now, if you have your NutriBullet or your Vitamix and you're wondering, what's the first thing I should make nut milk, okay, nut milk is the thing you need to perfect because you're going to use it for so many different things for baking for drinking, for putting on your ads, all kinds of different things. This is one of the things you want to master up front. And the easiest way to do that it was with a simple nut milk recipe that doesn't make you want to pull your hair out. And we've got a free one for you go below this episode in the show notes, we'll put a link to free nut milk recipe that we've created. It's our own special one that we use every day. And listen, it's called perfect become milk. But if you don't like pecans, don't let that stop you from opting in to get it because what you need to know is you can use any nut, you can make pistachio nut milk. Now that's not something you're typically going to find on a store shelf. But that's how you get more nutrients. That's how you get more flavor. That's how you create a life you love. Start playing around with things figuring out the way you like it, make it your own, and enjoy. We've loved having you join us today. And before you go follow and subscribe and be sure to leave a review and we'll look forward to seeing you again very soon.