Ninja!

Every once in a while, you're wandering through life, in a daze, when you stumble upon a life changing moment. It's usually quite a shock, but it's a pleasant one.  About twenty minutes ago, my life changed forever.  I used my Ninja!  It is a food processor that allows me to crush, blend, and chop!  

Because I have started making new dishes each week for Mark, I have found myself ill equipped.  I was fed up with trying to chop and dice random vegetables that I had never used before.  I decided that I needed some type of food processor.  We looked at some traditional models when we were in the mall, but I refrained from getting any at that time.  I wanted to further research to get a quality machine. 

Leap forward in time about twenty minutes, and we're perusing the kitchen wares at Sam's Club.  Sitting on the shelf, with a modest price tag of $50, is the Ninja!  I had heard of them before and was curious.  After inspecting the floor model, we decided to take the plunge, proudly placing our new toy in the cart.  

Much to Mark's annoyance, I have a tendency to get really excited about something, buy it, cart it home, and then wait two weeks to actually get it out and use it.  This is, of course, what happened with our Ninja.  Tonight, that all changed.  Tonight, I pulled it out of the box and set about using it!

The Ninja, aside from coming with an awesome name, came with four different chopping containers.  There is a large pitcher, a smaller pitcher, and two small containers.  The small containers are identical, coming with one blade to share between the two.  The two pitchers each come with their own blades.  There are lids for each container, in case you choose to store your chopped/diced/decimated product in them.  There is a single "pod" that houses the motor.  When you want to use the different containers, you just swap the pod onto the containers, which act as a base.  As far as I have found, the pod does not lock on and is very easy to swap.

Reducing the food to tiny bits is also simple.  Toss in the item you want chopped, diced, etc., place the splash guard piece on, drop the pod on the top, and press the giant silver button.  If you want something chopped, use short bursts.  If you want to blend, hold it down.  It's that simple.  

To try out my Ninja, I decided to make buffalo chicken dip.  My recipe was given to my be a friend I used to work with, and it is much different that some of the versions I have had in the past.  I usually cook chicken breast or use rotisserie chicken, which I shred using a fork.  It is very time consuming and annoying.  It takes forever.  Once it is shredded, I throw cream cheese, ranch dressing, and Frank's Red Hot into my small crock pot.  Once it is all heated up, it's good to go.

Tonight, I pulled out the Ninja, choosing the smaller pitcher to use for my chicken attack.  I threw in a breast that had been cooked and quartered.  With baited breath, I pressed the silver button...

And my life was forever changed.

This thing is awesome!  My chicken ended up in tiny little pieces, which is exactly what I wanted!  They were uniform in size.  It was just amazing.  After calling Mark over to show him and prattling on about how awesome it was, I finally moved on and put together my dip.  

I had a food processor before, and it was a pain to clean.  The little blades didn't like to come out, and I was always afraid of cutting myself.  With the Ninja, I pulled out the pod, which had no food on it.  Next, I pulled off the splash guard lid piece, which I rinsed off.  Next, I pulled out the blades and rinsed them.  Finally, I rinsed out the pitcher.  No food was stuck in tiny little hard to reach without cutting off your finger pieces.  The box says the items are dishwasher safe, but I will hand wash them to keep my Ninja in good condition.  

I have nothing but words of praise for my Ninja.  It slices!  It dices!  It teaches your veggies not to f*ck with you!  If you don't have one of these glorious machines, get to Sam's Club and pick one up!  They are amazing!