19 out of 19 people found this review helpful.
Excellent for a Blade Grinder
Date of Review: Jul 5, 2007
The Bottom Line: Great for a blade grinder. Leaves a few un-ground beans, but good grind overall. Minimal mess and no static electricity. Removable, washable grinder puts it over the top.
This is a great blade grinder and a very good grinder overall for the price. I grind enough beans for 6-8 cups every morning and occasionally grind for 10-12 cups if we have company.
If you've shopped for a coffee grinder or used several, you see it's a matter of tradeoffs. The Kitchen Aid has a nice, large all-stainless grinding cup. The plastic dome cover completely encases the cup, and you push down on the dome to activate the switch and grind the coffee. The dome has a little lip at the top underside, so when you push all the way down to grind it sort of seals around the top edge of the stainless cup.
As far as grinding, I think the tradeoff in blade grinders is between capacity and completeness of grind. The Kitchen Aid hopper is large for a blade grinder, so there are always a few untouched beans in my filter basket. This is, to some extent, a symptom of all blade grinders. The spinning blade creates a kind of whirlpool and the beans are supposed to cycle through. "Dead spots" in the vortex can leave some beans untouched.
Grinders with smaller cups may grind more completely, but they often pulverize all or some of the coffee to powder. A more powerful motor in this grinder might help, but I doubt it. The only other solution is to switch to a burr grinder, in which gravity pulls every bean through the burr grinder and ensures complete, even grind. Burr grinders (any worth buying) are probably going to be more expensive than the $35 Kitchen Aid or other good blade grinders.
You have to decide for yourself if you can live with a few beans escaping the whirring blade. It's annoying, but I don't think it affects the flavor of my average pot.
Contrary to some of the epinions on this grinder, the Kitchen Aid is the cleanest blade grinder I've used. (I hated the angled cup/cover of my little Krups Fast Touch grinder which, always spilled over.) Grinding coffee in any grinder is going to leave some coffee dust on your countertop but should not pepper your walls, floor and ceiling. Static electricity can be the biggest mess creator, and this grinder doesn't seem to build up too much static. I was tempted by the inexpensive Black & Decker CBM 7B burr grinder. With so much plastic, it's a static electricity nightmare and shoots coffee powder everywhere.
There is a max fill line. As with any blade grinder, over-filling will overflow the cup. With this grinder, overfilling can cause the little lip at the top of the dome to clog up with coffee dust. When the lip clogs, you can't push the dome down far enough to activate the switch to grind the coffee. I haven't had this problem at home, but at work where we use the same grinder and nice, oily beans, we've clogged the lip a few times. You just clean the lip out with the corner of a dish rag and move on.
All of us who grind our own coffee beans probably have some type of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Untouched beans may drive you nuts, but you'll love the fact that the Kitchen Aid grinding cup is totally removable. It has a bayonet mount, so you can twist it off the motor just like you would remove a camera lens. Finally, you can put some soap and water to your grinding cup and get your coffee grinder as clean as you want!
Overall, considering the price I think you can't go wrong with this grinder.
