The return of the vegetable grater


The return of the vegetable grater
If you are of a certain age (say +50) you may have known, when you were a kid, something that your grandmother had in her kitchen set, the vegetable grater.

A kind of mill, to be turned by hand, and which with cutting discs of different sizes, allowed to grate a lot of vegetables, carrots first in my memory, and then all the others.
15 K 4.6/5 (23 reviews)
Grade this page:
Keywords for this post:VegetablesGraterUtensilToolMaterial
Last modified on: March 20th 2021
For this post: Comment Follow Ask me a question Send to a friend
The return of the vegetable grater
In my memory, it was a big metal thing that could be bought on the markets (from the guy who sold a bewildering number of knives and savers), you needed a certain amount of grip to use it, but it grated pretty much anything and it looked a lot like this:

râpe à légumes métallique



Over time, like almost everything else that was manual for that matter, it disappeared, replaced by robots, robo-cutters, or electric graters, which are much easier to operate.

robot-coupe



The problem with food processors is that they run very fast, too fast even to grate properly, and that they have an annoying tendency to make very thin, very small pieces, too much I think, and on top of that to produce a bit of juice.

For a raw carrot or beet salad, it's not too bad, but for celery (future celery remoulade) or potatoes (future potatoes) or cooked vegetables, it's not good at all, it's much too thin, almost crushed, whereas in these 2 cases at least, you want long and well shaped pieces.

The manufacturers of kitchen equipment have of course reacted since a long time, and propose electric graters, which turn more slowly, and give good results it is necessary to recognize it.

râpe à légumes électrique



But at the same time, we are witnessing a comeback of grandma's vegetable grater, entirely manual, but in more modern materials (stainless steel, plastic), never breaks down, consumes 0 kw, and is easily washed under water

râpe à légumes moderne




It's often a good option to go back to the basics, to the things that stand the test of time, and the vegetable grater is one of them.

What to choose?

- If you already have an electric grater, don't change anything, or if you're looking to save energy, switch to a manual grater.
- If you already have "something that turns fast" like a food processor, it's really worth it to switch to a vegetable grater, and it's not necessary to get an electric one. A manual grater, like the one above, costs about 20 euros, and is very suitable for a family.

Be careful though, don't get a cheap grater, made of fragile plastic, which will break quite quickly. As always for the material, you have to pay the price, it is an investment in time.
The price is forgotten, the quality remains.

We realize that 50 years later, some of our grandmother's tools still work very well, and that we have not done better since.
Same thing for the vegetable mill, but it is another subject...

You've probably noticed that I'm very attached to cooking with children, I often talk about it, convinced that it's the first and most efficient way to fight junk food.
Well, you can very well entrust children with the manual vegetable grater, they don't risk hurting themselves, and the effort to be made is rewarding for them (a little discreet help can sometimes be necessary).
They will be proud to help prepare the carrot salad, next Sunday's starter.

To sum up: To grate vegetables, nothing beats a good manual grater.

Lasts posts
The grease spray
The grease spray
As soon as you have something in a recipe that sticks to the mold, the question always arises as to how difficult it is to remove from the mold. There's nothing more frustrating than breaking your cake when unmolding it, because part of it has stuck in the mold. The classic way to avoid this is...
August 26th 20253,1785
Cake moulds
Cake moulds
When we make a cake, or a cake of the same rectangular shape, we usually take out our usual mould and tell ourselves that the recipe is anyway "for a cake", but is it really that simple?
August 25th 20254,3105
Thinning out herbs
Thinning out herbs
If you need to add a long-stemmed herb (tarragon, mint, verbena, thyme, etc.) to a recipe, you'll probably only need the leaves and not the stem, so you'll need to remove the leaves. Leaf removal means keeping only the beautiful leaves, and eliminating the ugly stems and leaves, but how do you do...
August 8th 20252,5275
Add a bay leaf
Add a bay leaf
Bay leaf: small in size, but big in flavor. You'll find it in hundreds of recipes, and it's often added to cooking meat, in a sauce or broth, usually accompanied by other herbs or products. It's a staple of Provençal, Mediterranean and Oriental cuisine, but not the only one. Usually, in a...
July 31th 20252,6215
Parsley stems
Parsley stems
Parsley, whether curly or flat, is a delicious ingredient in many recipes, where it is used both raw and cooked. When used raw, in a salad for example, where it always provides, alone or with other herbs, a remarkable freshness, only the leaves are kept. And when used cooked?
July 28th 20252,839 13

Other pages you may also like
The grease spray
The grease spray
As soon as you have something in a recipe that sticks to the mold, the question always arises as to how difficult it is to remove from the mold. There's nothing more frustrating than breaking your cake when unmolding it, because part of it has stuck in the mold. The classic way to avoid this is...
August 26th 20253,1785
85 grams of eggs?
85 grams of eggs?
Some time ago, I already spoke to you about the difference between baking and pastry-making, I emphasized, among other things, the precision of pastry-making which requires grams, cm, degrees and minutes. That's why, on the one hand, you have baking and cooking, where a certain tolerance is...
November 26th 201853 K4.6
A few tips for effective kneading at home
A few tips for effective kneading at home
When you have to knead dough for bread or some other recipe, you may well use a food processor or the type of machine known as a stand mixer. The best-known brands are Kenwood and KitchenAid. They are useful tools, but here are a few tips to help you get the best out of them.
June 23th 2021279 K 23.7
Coarsely chopped herbs
Coarsely chopped herbs
Although we are in the middle of winter as I write these lines, you should not hesitate to make salads at this time, it is actually quite simple, rather fast, and so pleasant. A while ago, I already told you that a salad is a salad, but a salad with herbs is immediately something much better:...
January 9th 202113 K4.9
How to sprinkle well?
How to sprinkle well?
When in a recipe you need to sprinkle something, that is to say to spread a fine layer of powder (flour, sugar, etc.) on something, powdered sugar on a pie for example, you will probably use a fine strainer or a sieve, this is the best way to proceed. But is that all?
May 23th 20238,5304.7
Post a comment or question
Posted by:
I am not a leaving thing

Follow this page
If you are interested in this page, you can "follow" it, by entering your email address here. You will then receive a notification immediately each time the page is modified or a new comment is added. Please note that you will need to confirm this following.
I am not a leaving thing
Note: We'll never share your e-mail address with anyone else.
Alternatively: you can subscribe to the mailing list of cooling-ez.com , you will receive a e-mail for each new recipe published on the site.

Back to top of page