New Food Slicer

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
A couple months ago, I got a new food slicer. It works great. No complaints, it is easy to set up and easy to clean.
Plus, I ordered it online using a ton of coupons, so I got it for a great price.

Thus far, we've made Cubans (slicing up pork loin), Reubens (slicing up corned beef) and French Dip sandwiches (using marinated bottom round for the roast beef).

I could be fine with all that, but - I haven't found anything else to slice that isn't cheaper to just cut up myself.
For example if I buy one of those long pepperoni sticks? It's cheaper to just buy it sliced.
Most cheeses I've seen come sliced for about the price getting it unsliced.

I'm not much of a foodie - but - I do think the slicer is fun. I got it however, to save money.
I'm not going to slice up fresh bread no matter how good it tastes if it's actually a lot more expensive.

What else can I do with it? Do you use yours for a lot? I figure maybe sliced ham - I did do turkey breast with leftover turkey last time we had one.
But the thing with ham is the damned bone. Slice what? London Broil for thin steaks?
 

jazz lady

~*~ Rara Avis ~*~
PREMO Member
I don't have a motorized food slicer, but use the heck out of my manual mandolin and spiralizer. My main uses are for thinly sliced veggies (especially potatoes!) and fruit, shredding cabbage, shredding and slicing cheese, slicing stick meat like pepperoni, and making zoodles (zucchini noodles) with the spiralizer. I find that the mandolin is more flexible as it can do more types of cuts and there is some overlap on functionality on the two pieces of equipment.

I have also have a good serrated bread knife for slicing loaves and a small motorized food processor for grinding spices and making small batches of things like pesto.
 

vraiblonde

Board Mommy
PREMO Member
Patron
I had a restaurant-grade slicer that I thought I'd use all the time. I may have actually used it once. It was a pain to clean and slicing lunch meat wasn't worth the hassle.

But I was a singlet, too, and may have used it more if I'd had a passel of kids.
 
I had a restaurant-grade slicer that I thought I'd use all the time. I may have actually used it once. It was a pain to clean and slicing lunch meat wasn't worth the hassle.

But I was a singlet, too, and may have used it more if I'd had a passel of kids.

That is exactly why I got rid of mine. I had grandiose ideas of buying bulk cold cuts and slicing them myself, and slicing roasts and such. Turns out stuff goes bad long before you can use it all, and cold cuts don't freeze well. Wasn't worth the effort and the cleanup.
 

Merlin99

Visualize whirled peas
PREMO Member
A couple months ago, I got a new food slicer. It works great. No complaints, it is easy to set up and easy to clean.
Plus, I ordered it online using a ton of coupons, so I got it for a great price.

Thus far, we've made Cubans (slicing up pork loin), Reubens (slicing up corned beef) and French Dip sandwiches (using marinated bottom round for the roast beef).

I could be fine with all that, but - I haven't found anything else to slice that isn't cheaper to just cut up myself.
For example if I buy one of those long pepperoni sticks? It's cheaper to just buy it sliced.
Most cheeses I've seen come sliced for about the price getting it unsliced.

I'm not much of a foodie - but - I do think the slicer is fun. I got it however, to save money.
I'm not going to slice up fresh bread no matter how good it tastes if it's actually a lot more expensive.

What else can I do with it? Do you use yours for a lot? I figure maybe sliced ham - I did do turkey breast with leftover turkey last time we had one.
But the thing with ham is the damned bone. Slice what? London Broil for thin steaks?

Mine is a seasonal thing, it gets used a lot in the fall to slice up stuffed hams and to slice up cabbages for sauerkraut. The other thing it's good for is paper this slices of rib roast for steak subs, this is only around Christmas when Nicks has them for around five bucks a pound.
 

limblips

Well-Known Member
Add a good dehydrator to your kitchen arsenal and use the slicer to evenly slice fruits and veggies. Spoilage is not much of an issue with dehydrated goods. I use mine a lot to make beef jerky since I make 30-40 lbs a year which is a ton of slicing plus the even slices dry more evenly.
 

black dog

Free America
I had a restaurant-grade slicer that I thought I'd use all the time. I may have actually used it once. It was a pain to clean and slicing lunch meat wasn't worth the hassle.

But I was a singlet, too, and may have used it more if I'd had a passel of kids.

I also have a commercial Hobart slicer, it gets a good workout every fall from my son, many friends and myself slicing different meats for making jerky.
We have had a few grocery stores go under out here and I got a great deal at one auction. Otherwise I would still be using a handcrank slicer.

Like Limb states above, I know my son paid more for the dryer we have than I paid for the slicer.. it's the size of a large college refrigerator..
 
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singlechen

New Member
A couple months ago, I got a new food slicer. It works great. No complaints, it is easy to set up and easy to clean.
Plus, I ordered it online using a ton of coupons, so I got it for a great price.

Thus far, we've made Cubans (slicing up pork loin), Reubens (slicing up corned beef) and French Dip sandwiches (using marinated bottom round for the roast beef).

I could be fine with all that, but - I haven't found anything else to slice that isn't cheaper to just cut up myself.
For example if I buy one of those long pepperoni sticks? It's cheaper to just buy it sliced.
Most cheeses I've seen come sliced for about the price getting it unsliced.

I'm not much of a foodie - but - I do think the slicer is fun. I got it however, to save money.
I'm not going to slice up fresh bread no matter how good it tastes if it's actually a lot more expensive.

What else can I do with it? Do you use yours for a lot? I figure maybe sliced ham - I did do turkey breast with leftover turkey last time we had one.
But the thing with ham is the damned bone. Slice what? London Broil for thin steaks?

Similar experience. Most of the grocery counters I go to will slice up whatever meat I need if it is not sliced up already. Can you use yours to slice potatoes? You can always scallop them or make tornado potato skewers.
 

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
I had a restaurant-grade slicer that I thought I'd use all the time. I may have actually used it once. It was a pain to clean and slicing lunch meat wasn't worth the hassle..

So far it's been easy - I've cut up whole roasts on my lunch break at home, and had time for lunch.
The slicer I have is extremely easy to clean - it has just four parts to clean.

So far, I've learned what I can and can't cut easily. Corned beef is my favorite to slice.
Pork loins, bottom roast, turkey breast (from leftover turkey).

With the newer Foreman grill - it's wide and easy to clean, unlike its predecessor - we've done
all kinds of grilled sandwiches. Still haven't done Monte Cristos, because they're supposed to be fried and not grilled,
but you can make the bread ahead of time.
 

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
That is exactly why I got rid of mine. I had grandiose ideas of buying bulk cold cuts and slicing them myself, and slicing roasts and such. Turns out stuff goes bad long before you can use it all, and cold cuts don't freeze well. Wasn't worth the effort and the cleanup.

As I have mentioned in posts - I plan the meal before slicing.
So if we want Reubens, we prepare the corned beef and then chill it so it can be easily cut.
Ditto marinating bottom roasts, and we undercook them so they remain pink in the center.

We DON'T just slice stuff up and use it some time later. We use it right away.
 

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
Thanks to all for the ideas - it hadn't occurred to me to use it for preparing jerky (we have a dehydrator that gets very little use)
or using it to thinly slice vegetables, although I can only think of a few vegetables where thinly slicing them would be useful.
 

Gilligan

#*! boat!
PREMO Member
I have a vintage American Slicing Machine and use it often. Thin slice my cured hams after cooking them and thin slicing various cuts of beef after they come off the smoker.
 

lucky_bee

RBF expert
Thanks to all for the ideas - it hadn't occurred to me to use it for preparing jerky (we have a dehydrator that gets very little use)
or using it to thinly slice vegetables, although I can only think of a few vegetables where thinly slicing them would be useful.


Which one did you get? It doesn't sound like some monstrous deli-counter sized one, but more like one I can handle storing for part time use...my guy wants one specifically for his jerky, which he makes at least once a month, and I'd love it if it was smaller so I could also use it as a mandolin slicer for veggies/potatoes etc.
 

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
Which one did you get? It doesn't sound like some monstrous deli-counter sized one, but more like one I can handle storing for part time use...my guy wants one specifically for his jerky, which he makes at least once a month, and I'd love it if it was smaller so I could also use it as a mandolin slicer for veggies/potatoes etc.

The brand is Chef's Choice. I don't know which model, (615?) but I didn't pay more than 150.
No, it's not a monstrous sized one and I don't think I'd use one that big.
The two pieces for putting in the food to be sliced pop or slide right off and clean easily.
The blade, I just unscrew with a butter knife tip and wash it well, and everything else wipes down fairly easily.

And it's pretty safe - it doesn't spin very fast, so it's not like having a table saw on the countertop,
but it does a good job for what I use it for. I've been very pleased with it.
 
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