Vacu Vin Pineapple Easy Slicer, set of 3 blade sizes.
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Our Price: $14.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $12.00 (click here) Category: Kitchen See more product details |
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Kitchen and Housewares Reviews of Vacu Vin Pineapple Easy Slicer, set of 3 blade sizes.
Customer Review: Decent but not as good as manually cutting!
Summary: 4 Stars
We eat a lot of pineapple in my household. Usually 3 per week in the summer months and 2 per week in the winter months. Looking at all of the positive reviews for these I figured I would give it a try. Its important to note that I worked at a first rate deli/restaurant for close to 10 years. One of my jobs was cutting up the fruit salad. It usually consisted of 8-10 Pineapples, 4 Watermelon, 4 Honeydew, 6 Cantaloupes, 40-50 Oranges, and so on and so on. In other words I am pretty damn good at cutting fruit. Even with that being the case if there is a kitchen utensil out there that can make cutting fruit easier then I am all for it which is exactly why I chose to buy one of these.
I chose the plastic version over the Stainless Steel version because there are a lot of negative reviews for the Stainless cutter because, according to the reviewers, it has a smaller diameter than the plastic version which leaves a lot of good pineapple left attached to the skin after cutting. So you either have to accept that your going to get less usable fruit or you have to go back and cut the rest out by hand. Well the whole reason I decided to get one of these was so I wouldn't have to cut them by hand. If I have to go back and cut out the rest of the fruit then whats the point in using it at all. Why not just cut the entire thing by hand to begin with? Anyways the plastic version doesn't have this problem so I decided that this was more important than build quality.
I received my cutter a couple weeks ago and I openly admit I was impressed. It required more effort than I though it was going to but not so much effort to make it difficult. You just have to put some muscle behind it. Overall I cant really think of anything negative to say about it. If you love pineapple and have trouble cutting it or just hate cutting it then you should definitely give one of these a try. With that being said, I myself am going to continue to cut Pineapple by hand. Why? Because I have been cutting fruit for so long that I can do it practically blindfolded. I can cut an entire pineapple in less than a minute so I just don't see any real advantage in using one of these. I though it would be faster and easier but it wasn't. While most people will find it faster and easier, those who are good with knives and know how to cut fruit will probably just continue to cut it by hand.
Overall its a great gadget that many people will find extremely useful. Even so I am sticking with a knife.
4 stars
Customer Review: Another gadget I didn't know I needed until I used it
Summary: 5 Stars
On a recent blog that I read the Vacu Vin Pineapple Easy Slicer was mentioned favorably. It sounded interesting and the price was right, so I bought one. Then I thought back and realized I had never purchased a whole pineapple. My entire experience with pineapple at home had been of the canned variety, so I was looking forward to trying this.
I bought what I had hoped was a ripe pineapple at my local grocer and brought it home. Although it didn't look very confusing I was surprised that it contained very little instruction. Just a few small pictures on the box, but here is how it works:
1. Cut off the top of the pineapple. (I cut significantly less than what the picture showed - it seemed like that would waste too much.)
2. Decide on the size blade you need. (The suggest going by weight, but I chose based on the width of the pineapple.)
3. Take slicer and start twisting down into the pineapple. (It's the same motion you would use turning on an outside faucet.)
4. Once you reach the base of the pineapple, pull up to remove the fruit.
What I ended up with was some beautifully ripe, juicy pineapple and if you just cut straight down into the layer you will have pineapple rings. For me there was very little waste and it took less than 3-4 minutes to do it. That night we added the juice to some chicken marinade and then grilled the pineapple. What a difference FRESH pineapple makes!! I also like that the pineapple shell can be used for display (or even better by serving pina coladas in it). I added a picture so that you can see a little bit of what to expect.
Customer Review: BEST EVER
Summary: 5 Stars
This thing is seriously the best invention EVER for pineapples. I had some concern with the quality of it (since it's plastic), but it cuts through tough pineapples with no problem at all. You just barely press down and twist and it creates perfect circular slices! Most pineapples will use the medium slicer, but if you want to really get the most out of the pineapple you can use the large. I would say that you don't really need the two additional slicer sizes, but I am sure they will come in handy one day
There are two problems that I have with it, however. First, it still gets messy because a lot of juice comes up and spills over the flat top, so you still need to do this over a sink or something (but it is easy to hold the pineapple with one hand and twist the slicer with the other). Second, I would suggest to picture how deep you need to go by holding the slicer up to the pineapple before you start cutting. The slicer cuts through the first couple of inches with no problem at all, then towards the bottom it gets tougher. It takes awhile to figure out just how far down you need to go to avoid poking a hole through the bottom or leaving too much uncut pineapple at the bottom.
All in all, it is one of my favorite kitchen utensils. I bought several more to give away as presents as well.
Customer Review: This thing is great, love it!
Summary: 5 Stars
We looked at several of these devices to gut a pineapple. The stainless steel one looked good, but noticed, like several others, that it only came in one size, medium.
So, we settled on this fellow, as it had three sizes of cutters. We are really glad we got this, as most of the pineapples we get are large, a couple were medium. As long as you are going to do this, we feel it is best to get the biggest pineapples you can find.
I am amazed at how easy it is to use this. Perhaps the only tricky part is knowing when to stop turning when you reach the bottom, but even if you keep going, you will just cut through the bottom.
Some hints: 1. After cutting the top off, put the fruit into a plastic pan of some kind, as a lot of juice will come out. 2. When finished cutting, instead of trying to hold the outside of the pineapple and pull the fruit out. just hold the plastic tube and pull the outside off. Something like pulling a sock off your foot. 3. For some reason, we notice that the fruit gets sweeter after a day or two, so put it in a plastic covered dish in the fridge, and wait a bit.
4. When pulling the fruit out, don't hold the removable handle, as it will come off too easily; just hold the tube.
Love the taste of fresh pineapple, and love this thing..
Customer Review: Awesome gadget
Summary: 4 Stars
Normally I'm not a fan of kitchen gadgets that only do a limited range of things. However, I love fresh pineapple but dislike the effort it takes to cut one up (the acid from the pineapple is hard on my hands). I just cut up my first pineapple with this tonight, and wow, it really does the job incredibly fast. It took me less than a minute. It didn't take as much strength as I expected based on previous reviews, either. There was a lot of juice in the bottom of the hollowed-out pineapple, but I always kept the fruit upright, so it was not messy at all.
I gave four stars because it would be very difficult to impossible to make any shapes other than rings/very thin wedges. If I were making a fruit salad for company or for a potluck I would probably take the time to cut a pineapple up with a knife. Also, as a previous reviewer mentioned, when I removed the pineapple rings from the pineapple, the handle popped out of the slicer part. It's a minor thing, as I just grabbed the slicer around the top and used that to wiggle the pineapple out.
This gadget was definitely worth the money.