Should I buy a mortar and pestle? I kinda like the idea of having one...

Should I buy a mortar and pestle? I kinda like the idea of having one, but I feel like it's is a meme and would never be used.

Seems like the kind of thing I would either buy and use once and forget about or buy and find new things to make with it and reasons to use it.

no.
get a coffee grinder.

It'll look real cool in the back of your cabinet

I use mine when I'm making guacamole or chimichurri. guess you could use it for dry rubs etc too

They're useful when you want fresh spice powders, and your food tends to taste better.

They usually just sit in the back of your cabinet because who has the time to grind their own spices, lol.

I use mine all the time for just black pepper corns.

I use mine for several things, usually to make a pulp sauce to season/rub on meats.

Not a meme. I use mine all the time, at least 3x week, it's awesome. Mine is fairly a fairly small marble model and cost me $15. Worth every penny.

Things I I use it for:
Crushing fresh garlic
Crushing herbs
Grinding whole spices

It brings out the flavor in everything above 100x better than mincing.

>back of the cabinet
It's a counter top item unless your kitchen is the size of a small closet.

Yeah, they're nice to have.

90% of the time I use mine for simply crushing toasted spices for blends/curries/whatever and pepper.

But it's nice to know it's there for anything else I might want to make in it as well.

of course you dont, stupid.
only buy things for the kitchen when you wanted to use them for something on multiple occasions.
if you dont know what youll use it for you dont need it

The point is, it will never get used, thus being put in a cabinet

I bought one recently without knowing how much use I'd get out of it. They're cheap and not to difficult to store so not much of a downside if they don't get too much use.

After trying it a few times, I've started using it for everything. Peppercorns, garlic, ginger, chilli; anything that's frustrating to grind or chop to a fine consistency is made so much easier by crushing them. I've started making a lot of pastes too and using them like homemade hot sauce. Is pretty good. Dunno if it makes my food tastes much better, but it's more convenient than I thought and means I can make stuff I'd usually buy pre-prepared.

There are few things more satisfying than beating the ever-loving shit out of an ingredient in a mortar with a pestle.

I got one for christmas last year and have used it maybe a dozen times this year. It's very useful for dishes with spice blends as many people have said, but also it's useful for fresh green pastes like chimichurri, pesto, and so on. Being able to keep spices whole will let them last longer and taste better, and beating aromatics to a pulp gives them better flavour.

my wife uses it for grinding up chili paste, garlic, stuff like that. I think these are a staple in indonesia, because she uses it regularly. Otherwise I would have tossed it by now because it permanently takes up a chunk of counter space

Yes and make asmr vids with it.

I use mine all the time. I crush all my spices with it. I've started getting into making thai curry paste and grind all the ingredients like lemongrass, galangal, garlic, and chilis as well as the spices. It's meditatetively enjoyable for me to be in touch with my food like that. Also the granite ones are indestructible. It's a once in a lifetime purchase I can pass on to my demon spawn.

>BOWL AND STICK

for a great pesto sauce

real answer is that it depends on how seriously you take your cooking, as well as your general preference in what type of food you like to cook. The more serious you take cooking, the more likely you are to need something like a mortar and pestle. Some people don't buy pre-ground spices, and grind said spices every time they're called for. they're the people who use a mortar and pestle 5x a week. That's not me. Yet, I have a big ass mortar and pestle, because when I want to do a specific type of cooking right (eg Indian, or making a rosmary-thyme salt to rub lamb chops with), a mortar and pestle is required to do it right. In the end, you need to have a heart-to-heart with yourself, user. Only you can tell you if you really will use it enough to be worth it in your mind, because that changes from person to person. There are people who use a mortar and pestle twice a year, and consider it a worthwhile purchase, and there are probably people who use it once a month and think "man, I never should have bought this!"

in the end, see pic

My mom and grandma have been using them for ages, they've told me in the past that it's very useful and most people don't even know about them

Enjoy having rock powder in your food.

I use one because my blender is broken and it's kind of a pain to get out a blender for a tablespoon of sesame seeds anyway

seems like it would be a pain to clean after guac. I made some today with a plastic container and a fork.

You can get a wooden one but mine is stone and I've never seen or felt grit in my food. If there's anything there it's microscopic and it isn't going to be noticeable.

I have two.

One wooden, one stone.

The stone one is for grinding. Making stuff powder-like. It also makes pastes and dips the easiest.

Wooden one mashes veggies, garlic, it's the one I use the most.

Well then use it faggot.

I use mine for drugs

I use mine to crush the hearts of my enemies.

I have one and have never used it. I can't figure out what to use it with.

I think coffee grinder is something to consider. I didn't have one and thought well i guess I could use a mortar and pestle (to grind up morning glory seeds into apple sauce) and couldn't find it.

I don't have one, but I'd use it all the time if I didn't have a grinder for spices/coffee/flax and a blender. Some stuff is supposedly better when done manually, like Chef John's bowl of oil with pesto garnish.

You need to keep a separate mortar and pestle for crushing up pills, if you do it in the one you use for spices/etc you'll potentially pollute the flavors.

maybe ask your wife?

I only ever use mine for grinding saffron for paellas and fried rice cakes for lap kai

you can use it to make some hot sauce.

mexicans know the real deal

food is best
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>talk to my wife
no thanks

I use mine all the time. I'm not all that great a cook though so I have no idea if it's actually improving anything. I really like grinding cumin up though.

i bought one off amazon for making guacamole

after i took it out the box I cleaned it and found that the stone was mixing in with the water.\

I don't eat rock so I threw it away.

is it actually any better than a food processor?

It doesn't REPLACE a food processor if that's what you're asking. However it is great for spices and herbs.

I use mine almost every day. It's much quicker and easier to whip out and grind a few things in it than it is to use and clean a blender. It's the only real way to make good pesto. And it's a lot quicker to grind fistfuls of pepper than with a pepper grinder.

IMHO it's a different tool for different jobs.
A mortar and pestle is great for hard spices which a food processor is useless for.

For softer foods the food processor starts to come into its own. The M&P does a better job since it crushes out all the essential oils/flavors of whatever you're working with rather than slicing it into chunks like the food pro does. But I must admit using the M&P for that is a lot of work, so I usually end up using the food pro.

Oh, and one other thing: it's really easy to do small batches with the M&P, whereas batches that are too small just don't work at all in the food pro.

>easier to whip out and grind a few things in it than it is to use and clean a blender.

How so? Both are two pieces, they're just as much/little effort to clean. Unless you have some shit blender that disassembles into several pieces, anyway. With any decent blender there's only two parts to wash: lid and the jar.

Hello, yes I have a question: don't you lose a bunch of flavor smeared on the side of the mortar?

Mortar and pestle is a simpler shape. It takes literally two seconds to rinse out. Plus some blenders have a removable blade.

Yeah, some food sticks to the side of it. It's no different than what you'd lose if you used a food processor or blender instead. There's always some food stuck inside the jar, on the blade, etc.

I just use mine to grind salt into an fine powder to use on my popcorn.

I bought one and can't think of any reason why I still use it instead of my food processor.