A meat grinder aside, we can use multiple cooking gadgets to produce good-quality ground meat, such as a kitchen hammer, sharp knife, blender, or food processor.
Out of all those appliances, blenders are a pretty versatile kitchen device. If you don’t have a meat grinder around your cabinet, a blender is an excellent alternative.
How to grind meat using a blender? To make ground meat with a blender, you need to prepare your meat (very essential), then start the blender, put in a small portion for each turn, and blend your meat for several rounds.
We will discuss the benefits of grinding meat at home, how it is different to grind meat with a blender from a meat grinder, and more. Time to go!
Table of Contents
Why Grinding Meat At Home?
Homemade ground meat is healthy and fresh
Grinding your own meat is superior to purchasing it in supermarkets or finding a butcher. Here are the reasons why.
Taste
Hand-chopped meat surely offers a much better taste than pre-ground meat.
While we all have been used to the texture of prepackaged ground meats, which are readily available, some dishes, particularly in Asian cuisines, just taste best with meat finely hand-chopped in the traditional way.
Our parents’ generation used to hand-chop cooked meat to fill in dumplings, baozi, or wontons. Essentially, old-fashioned cooked meat is meatier, more flavorful than the paste-like, indistinguishable prepackaged product.
View more: How to sharpen meat grinder blades
Health
Butchers usually grind meat with scraps and pack them neatly, so you basically have no idea what they put in the food.
Also, you merely have control over the fat content or cleanliness during the grinding process.
For example, people often make a ground chicken from chicken breast, so it’s very lean. Similarly, ground pork available in a grocery store or supermarket is pretty lean meat.
Ground beef may include various lean-to-meat ratios at the store, but pork, lamb, turkey, or chicken does not.
Practicality
If your family meals often have sausages, meatballs, or dumplings on the table, you must wish there is always ground meat on hand to cook instantly.
What can be more convenient than being able to grab a pack of chicken thighs or a piece of pork shoulder in your fridge and transform it into thin strips of meat whenever you want?
Grinding meat at home not only saves you trips to a butcher but also provides you control over the texture and coarseness of the ground meat. Thus, you can enjoy a fresher, juicier result in your dishes.
Can You Grind Meat In A Blender?
A blender can grind meat if you don’t have a meat grinder
Can you blend meat in a blender? The answer is yes. A blender is also of great assistance if you don’t have a meat grinder in your kitchen.
However, grinding meat with a blender is not as simple as with a meat grinder. You have to ensure your blender can handle the job before starting.
So, remember to measure a proper amount of meat and consider the type of meat you’re going to blend.
And look at your device as well. Consider how powerful the motor is and how efficient the blades are since the result largely depends on the blades and motor, whether you’re going to add full-on ground beef or shaved steak.
Notably, your blades need to be sharp and pretty new if they’re going to grind meat.
Most consumers are mistaken about the way a blender works. It doesn’t chop or cut through foods like what we expect. Instead, a blender blade is designed to crush ice, fruits, or vegetables.
Cheap department store blenders can merely handle over 6-8 ounces of meat at one time.
They don’t cost you much since they include basic and less sufficient motors, applying to cheap mass production.
Meat might cause resistance while making it more challenging for the blades to spin and exploit the motor.
Meanwhile, a high-grade blender can draw additional power when its motor faces resistance, offering consistency.
Now, what type of meat do you want to throw in the blender?
Turkey and chicken are the most straightforward to grind as they break apart very easily. Thus, you won’t have to worry about any problems.
If you want to blend steak, it should take you a while, whatever type of blender you have.
Last but not least, avoid overloading it, or else you might end up with inconsistent strips of meat.
How To Grind Meat In A Blender?
Prepare your meat well before starting grinding
If you’re not familiar with grinding meat in a blender, keep this tip in mind: ensure your blender is powerful enough to handle the job and, of course, start with a small quantity of meat.
This way, not only can you save a trip to the supermarket but also grind either raw or cooked meat quickly.
Prepare The Meat
To grind meat in blender, you have to prep your meat first.
It’s crucial to prepare meat before blending, given that a blender grinds meat in a slightly different way with a different kind of blade.
If you’re grinding raw meat, you’ll need to keep it as cold as possible during the process so that you can prevent bacterial growth in your food.
Any bacteria on the meat’s surface will still be present in the meat though you’ve processed it through a grinder, food processor, or blender.
Use a sharp knife to get rid of the gristle, bones, skin, fat, and connective tissue present in the meat.
Sausage making is a fantastic way to utilize more low-value, tougher meat cuts.
You can make it more effortless to grind meat with a blender by cutting all the pieces uniformly in the size of an inch or so.
Provided that you don’t cut them too large, they will be easy to break down.
To keep the meat below 40 degrees F throughout the blending process, store it in a bowl full of ice or a frozen metal bowl while you’re working.
You can also place the pieces of meat cuts onto a baking sheet lined with wax paper and your blender blade in the fridge for a few hours.
That way, your meat, and blades will be nicely cold before proceeding with the task.
Start Using Your Blender
The good news is that if you don’t frequently use your blender to grind meat, you’re good to go.
Regular grinding means your blender blades are not new and fresh, making them unsuitable for blending grinding purposes.
Unlike electric meat grinders, a blender includes a small and less powerful motor, which tends to clog up the grinder and take extra effort to blend meat.
That’s why you should grind your food in small portions rather than cramming as much as you can in a single go.
Add a decent amount of meat to your blender, choose the chop mode, and set the time to about 30 seconds.
After the machine stops, open the lid and examine the consistency.
Continue the steps again until you achieve the desired consistency.
Remember to avoid running the blender for over 40 seconds in a single round, or else you might overheat it and cause it to malfunction.
Depending upon how consistent you want your ground meat to be, adjust the time more or less.
Should you desire a rough texture for sausages, a few rounds should work.
However, if you’re cooking food for a baby or making puree, be patient and go through the process several times to gain a satisfying result.
Blender Vs. Meat Grinder
A meat grinder is the better performer
Of course, a meat grinder will perform way better than a blender or a food processor regarding grinding meat. Let’s immediately refer to the Best Electric Meat Grinders Review
Simply because a meat grinder is meant to grind meat, it provides superior efficiency and more control over the grinding process.
Do you want restaurant-quality cooked meat? Unfortunately, a blender can’t mimic the precise result you expect.
Yet, on the bright side, you can come close to the genuine deal, provided that your blender is super powerful.
Besides, meat grinders also deliver more power than standard blenders – one of the most significant reasons why you can grind meat more quickly and effectively with a meat grinder.
Plus, meat grinders can assist you in making bespoke and specialty items, like bratwurst sausages, while blenders or a food processor can rarely do something more than meat grinding.
Do It All Yourself
Ground meat is the soul thing of many delicious recipes, like Italian spaghetti or Turkey hamburger, and a fav item of many gourmet food lovers.
A blender comes with amazing versatility, being the best alternative to a meat grinder concerning grinding meat at home. With a high-powered blender on hand, you can do it all yourself.
We hope our thorough guide on blending meat in a blender can help you take the fullest advantage of your blender.
So now, enjoy your flavorful meat!
