Soup maker...dust gatherer or game changer?

[GolightlyMrsGolightly]

I make a fair amount of soup, usually lentil or minestrone, chunky soup with bits.

I use a pot and a spoon.

Should 8 buy a soup maker?

It depends how you cook?
Why do you think one would be good.if you get one it’s only useful if you have the sauté function.

Hardly ever make soup, slow cooker or pan

If you can just chuck everything in and leave it great. But presumably you have to pop the onions/soffrito in first and then chuck everything else in.

Dust gatherer

I like mine too! It comes out regularly.

I love mine and like a PP have soup for lunch most days from October through to the spring. I actually buy pre-chopped soup veg a lot, all you have to do is put it in with water and vegetable stock switch on and come back to soup 20 minutes later. I couldn’t be bothered with the pan and stick blender method now.

@GolightlyMrsGolightly

If you can just chuck everything in and leave it great. But presumably you have to pop the onions/soffrito in first and then chuck everything else in.

You need to chop things up first and sautee onions etc. I like the fact I can chop super quick with my vegetable chopper, Chuck it in and walk away. 20 mins later it’s done.

But yes you can also buy prechopped stuff and chuck it in. Even quicker!

I use ours all the time when it's cooler. It has a saute function, and I'd say that's essential. Set it going, go for a walk and come back to lovely soup. They're very easy to clean, and wouldn't need to go in a dishwasher. I find the soup is quicker to make (as it blends part way through so ingredients cook more quickly) and is smoother than using a stick blender. Also it avoids the scoring that can sometimes appear on the bottom of a pan when you use a stick blender.

It was a game changer for me, but only because I am really really bad a making soup. Whenever I make it by hand it seperates and is either too thick or a bowl of watery nonsense.

The soup maker makes a couple of bowls in 20 minutes. All I have to do is bung the stuff in and press a button (or saute stuff for a bit, then bung stuff in a push a button). I don't use it every week, but use it every time I make soup.

mine went to a charity shop after using it twice.
to get tasty soups you need more heat than the 85 the (admittedly cheap) soup maker could do.
plus unless you fry onions to add it's really bland. but then you could just as well use the pot in the first place.
plus the one I had was a right pain to clean. so much stuff got stuck around thd blades.

I use mine a lot, just chuck everything in and the soup is ready in 20 mins.

I bought it from gumtree as I wasn't sure if I'd use it but it gets used every other week.

You definitely couldn't put it in the dishwasher but it's easy enough to clean.

plus it was too small for 4 portions if soup.

You can make soup in the slow cooker overnight by the way. I used to do that and it worked really well. In the morning I just blitzed it with a hand blender. So maybe something like an instant pot would be better. Then it would have more than one function and earn its place on the counter top.

I bought mine for £3 at a bootslae last summer and I've still not tried it

I use my slow cooker. If I had an Instant Pot I'd use that

I love mine, bought it at beginning of lockdown and have used it 2 or 3 times a week for lunch in the cooler weather. Really easy to clean.
Mine has a searing setting to fry onions etc first. its the larger one so does 4 good size portions. It also makes cold smoothies

plus it was too small for 4 portions if soup.
Mine does 4 large bowls of soup Think its a 1.6ltr although i think some are only a litre.

Mine is this one

It’s a game changer for me. WFH, often pop into kitchen early morning, throw everything into the pot and come back at lunchtime to a vat of healthy soup. Made a lovely pot of cauliflower and broccoli on sunday! Only thing I don’t cook in it is lentil soup as I find the lentils stick and burn. Other than that it’s brilliant !

I love mine, 20 minutes and ready to eat along with my bread from the bread maker.

bruffin, that's mine. I've had mine 4 years now.

I use mine most weekends. Both MIL and I got one at the same time, ours broke (after lots of use!) so she gave us hers as, although she used it, she's on her own, and she ended up with too much soup of the same flavour. She prefers to make smaller batches. You have to be careful not to overfill it, and to cut stuff up small to make sure it cooks and blends properly. There are some recipes which work better in a pan on the hob, but I like being able to just leave it to do it's thing. We usually get 6 bowls out of one batch, each about as much as half a tin of shop bought.

I love mine, I was a bit when my dad bought it for me but it’s actually great! I prefer smooth soups and it makes a lovely blended soup in 20 mins, just have to some veg and stock in and let it do all the work.