Chop, dice, slice, blend, mix, grate and purée like a pro by adding a food processor to your arsenal of kitchen gadgets. A food processor can make light work of complex recipes and save you precious prep time when whipping up healthy midweek meals – it’s little wonder Jamie Oliver’s 15-Minute Meals TV show and cookbook used a food processor in almost every recipe.
It’s the ultimate helping hand in the kitchen, especially if you’re cooking for a crowd or filling your freezer with batch-cooked goodness. Whether whizzing up chunky marinades, mixing healthy snacks or blending protein shakes, a food processor is a multi-tasking marvel. Here’s our pick of the best buys.
Best All-Rounder: Kenwood MultiPro Compact FDP301SI Food Processor
Lightweight and compact, this space-saving gadget is reassuringly sturdy and comes with a range of blades for slicing, grating and chopping as well as an emulsifying tool for whipping cream and eggs. Unusually for such an affordable machine, you can adjust the power settings and use the pulse button to mix things up in short bursts. It’s a good pick for small kitchens (as long as you have somewhere to stash the included blender attachment). £65 (RRP £75), buy on Amazon
Most Stylish Food Processor: KitchenAid Classic Food Processor
This retro-looking appliance offers a number of useful and unique features such as an adjustable disc to control the thickness of your slices, as well as a jumbo feed tube that can handle whole fruit and vegetables. There’s a reversible shredding disc for fine and coarse grating, and a multi-purpose blade for all your mixing and blending needs. £166 (RRP £199), buy on Amazon
Best Budget Food Processor: Andrew James Food Processor And Blender
Easy on the pocket and to use, this affordable appliance chomps through ingredients using a range of blades, graters and discs. It comes with a blender for smoothies and shakes and there are special attachments for slicing French fries and juicing fruits. It might not be as powerful as some of our other picks but for versatility and value, you can’t go wrong with this inexpensive option. £60, buy on Amazon
Best Multi-Tasking Food Processor: Nutri Ninja Complete Kitchen System
Equipped with a punchy 1,500-watt motor, this jack of all trades serves as a food processor, a large blender and a NutriBullet-style smoothie maker. It can blitz, blend, grate, slice and crush ice in a flash, and its handy one-touch Auto IQ programme lets you throw ingredients together and stand back while it works its magic. It comes with a range of blades, discs, jugs and cups so you’ll need to make sure you’ve got storage space, but this all-in-one gadget should cover all your kitchen needs. £150, buy on Argos
Best High-End Food Processor: Magimix 5200XL
A quality buy for foodies and families, this solid piece of kit comes with a 30-year guarantee so you can rest assured that it’s built to last. It has three different bowls to deal with everything from a single egg to a family feast and they all nest inside each other for easy storage. The dough blade, egg whisk, citrus press and discs for grating and slicing cover all culinary bases and the powerful 1,100-watt motor is surprisingly quiet. £302 (RRP £340), buy on Amazon
