Why These 10 Best Meat Grinder Are Actually Awesome
Everything tastes better when it’s homemade. You’re assured what the ingredients are and you know how fresh it is.
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With that said, making your own burger patties and sausages at home is better than buying at grocery stores. You’re guaranteed that your meat has fewer preservatives, less artificial flavors, and more real meat than extenders or fillers.
So what’s the first thing to do when you want to start making your patties or sausages? The answer to that is to get the best meat grinder. Without it, putting sausages in casings would be difficult or forming your patties won’t look as smooth as it should be.
We’ll guide you which meat grinders to get and which ones are under 100 or under 200 dollars. Whether it’s for meats, dog bones, vegetables, and other types of game, our list will have you covered.
Contents
- Best Meat Grinder On The 2022 Market
- #1. For Home Use: Gourmia GMG525 Electric Meat Grinder
- #2. Under $200: LEM Products 1158 Mighty Bite Electric Meat Grinder
- #3. Under $100: Homeasy Meat Grinder
- #4. For The Money: LHS Manual Meat Grinder
- #5. For Wild Game: STX Turboforce Classic 3000 Series Electric Meat Grinder
- #6. For Sausage Making: Chefman Choice Cut Electric Meat Grinder
- #7. For KitchenAid Mixer: KitchenAid KSMMGA Metal Food Grinder Attachment
- #8. For Bones: Weston 575 Watt Electric Heavy Duty Grinder
- #9. For Venison (Deer and Elk): LEM Products Stainless Steel Big Bite Electric Meat Grinder (#8 .50HP)
- #10. For Raw Dog Food: Sunmile SM-G50 ETL Electric Meat Grinder
- Best Meat Grinder Buying Guide
- FAQs About Meat Grinders
Best Meat Grinder On The 2022 Market
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Gourmia GMG525 is the meat grinder to have when you’re serious about getting started in making your burgers, sausages, and meatloaves. It’s designed to be compact with strong material and also looks sleek in your kitchen at home.
If you’re a pet owner, the GMG525 can grind through raw meats to feed to your dogs as well. But it’s recommended to leave out the bones as this grinder is for home use and might not respond too well to grinding bones.
The GMG525 is easy to use with its 3-way safety switch: on, off, and reverse. Assembling and disassembling it is also very quick and easy, especially when cleaning up. The blades and attachments that come with it are basic tools yet are very important for home use.
It’s also ETL certified, so you’re assured it’s safe to use and built with the most high-quality materials.
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CONS
LEM’s Mighty Bite Electric Meat Grinder is quite heavy at 16 lbs but this is because it can also withstand heavy-duty workloads. This ETL certified grinder is an easy-to-use tool despite how it looks. Just simply load up the tray with your desired meat, set the speed to your liking, and watch how it grinds up your meat.
The grinder comes with 3 stainless steel plates and 3 stuffing tubes for your sausages. Many grinders usually require meats to be cut up into small cubes, so it can fit through the funnel. But with LEM’s Mighty Bite grinder, it can take on large pieces of meat.
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At first glance, you won’t think of the Homeasy Meat Grinder as a powerful tool. For starters, it doesn’t look like a meat grinder but a food processor. But it works both ways which make this a very efficient and affordable tool to have at home.
The grinder uses four stainless steel blades to chop up and grind your meats and vegetables. The bowl is also made of stainless steel material which is durable and has a capacity of 2 liters. It has 2 speeds to choose from: fast and slow. The unit also comes with a mat, so it won’t slide along any surface while you’re using it.
The Homeasy Meat Grinder may not be an advanced tool but it’s an ideal home and kitchen appliance for those looking for one at an affordable price.
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There is a reason why there are still manual meat grinders in the market. They’re still considered and dependable as electric ones and can get the job done.
LHS’s Manual Meat Grinder is a simple appliance that’s perfect for home use and is very affordable. It’s a no-frills kind of equipment wherein all you have to do is install the blade and handle, turn the knob to secure the suction on the surface, and then insert your meat to grind.
What people love about this manual meat grinder is how it comes with a cookie shaper. You can add in your batter or dough, slide in your cookie shaper and turn the handle to get that uniform size for your cookies.
You can carry this meat grinder easily as it weighs only 2 lbs. It’s also easy to disassemble for you to clean.
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If you own an STX Turboforce Classic 3000 Series, then you know this appliance can cut up all your meat without problems. This electric meat grinder has everything you need to grind your meat including wild game. It can take on several pounds of meat without it overheating. It also comes with a stuffing plate for when you want to make sausages. 3 tube sizes are available, so you can make a variety of sausage sizes anytime you want.
Aside from wild game and sausages, the STX Turboforce Classic 3000 Series comes with a kibbeh attachment and 3 grinding plates, so you can choose from coarse, medium, and fine grind.
This grinder can grind 180 to 240 lbs per hour as long as you cut up your meat into cubes or strips.
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The Chefman Electric Meat Grinder is an ETL powerful appliance that can grind 210 pounds of meat per hour. It can grind all types of meat such as lamb, chicken, beef, and pork. This unit is recommended for making patties and meatloaves as well as sausages since it comes with 3 funnels for stuffing sausage casings easily.
The loading tray is spacious and can hold large amounts of meat as compared to other electric grinders. It also comes with a lid for when you want to use the tray as a storage container.
The Chefman Electric Meat Grinder may be small but it gets your meat-grinding job done how you like it.
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If you have a KitchenAid Mixer, you can purchase a meat grinder attachment for it. The KSMMGA Metal Food Grinder Attachment caught our eye than the other types of grinders. This is because it’s probably the sturdiest one since it’s made with aluminum rather than plastic.
The KSMMGA is easy to install. It comes with 3 grinding plates, 2 sausage tubes, and a food pusher, so all your basic needs are met.
All in all, instead of buying a whole separate meat grinder when you already have a KitchenAid mixer, just invest in an attachment. The KSMMGA will save you a lot of money.
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Though the Weston 575 Watt Electric Grinder doesn’t look the part, it’s a heavy-duty appliance that can grind your meats and bones in. That’s right. Even if it’s lightweight, Weston’s grinder can take on chicken thighs and legs.
The unit comes with 3 grinding plates and a sausage funnel. The loading tray is large as well. Weston’s food grinder is simple to put together with no fancy adjustments needed that many beginners opt for this appliance. It’s also easy to clean.
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Using LEM’s Stainless Steel Big Bite grinder means serious business. You can already tell by the stainless steel material it’s built from that this grinder is going to be durable. Their patented “Big Bite” auger is responsible for grinding 7 pounds of meat in one minute.
This grinder is ETL certified and is ideal for people who grind large meats such as venison and beef. It can also grind bones in although the bigger the unit you get, the bigger the chances of thicker bones you can grind. As for this review of the .50HP, chicken bones should be fine.
So if you don’t mind owning a large-sized meat grinder, this one should solve all of your deer grinding needs.
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If you’re a raw feeder and have large dogs in your home, buying an electric grinder that can particularly take on bones is a big help.
The Sunmile SM-G50 is an ETL certified meat grinder ideal for raw feeders as it can take on heavy-duty workloads and grind bones easily. It can grind 200 lbs of meat per hour and chicken bones with no problem. Some reviews even claim this grinder also works best with venison.
The grinder also has 3 grinding plate,s so you have options to choose from such as fine, medium, and coarse. There’s only one speed function which is ‘on’ but the reverse function is worth mentioning since this helps to unclog the meat if you go through some problems.
In conclusion, the SM-G50 should be able to satisfy your pets’ raw food grinding needs.
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Meat grinders are awesome kitchen appliances to have in your home. With these, you can make your patties and sausages without ever buying them in grocery stores again. You’ll be able to feed your family a healthier version of the ones in stores. Say goodbye to uncontrolled sodium levels and preservatives with a meat grinder as you make your meatloaf and meatballs.
With all these grinders working for different types of workloads, you’ll have various options to choose from for your future purchase. The attachments that come with them are also a breeze to work with.
But what should you even be looking for in a meat grinder? What makes a meat grinder an awesome one?
Best Meat Grinder Buying Guide
Buying a meat grinder is an important life decision. For one, you have to consider that meat grinders are expensive kitchen appliances. The cheapest ones are manual meat grinders but the electric ones that are of good quality can range from $40 to $700. Although the most expensive ones pack in a lot of power, it’s probably one you won’t need if you only need the basic functions of a meat grinder for home use.
So what are the factors you should be looking for?
Budget
You always have to consider your budget when you’re about to purchase a meat grinder. As mentioned above, they don’t come cheap. But a lot of high-quality meat grinders come at a reasonable rate.
If you’re a beginner and would like to try out meat grinding for the first time, you may invest in just a simple meat grinder for home use. Just be sure to read up on reviews if the grinder fits all of the basic things you need, so you won’t be paying for extra on features you’re sure is a little too advanced and heavy on the wallet for you.
Power Source
Are you looking for an electric meat grinder or a manual one? Both types can get the job done. Even the manual ones have attachments too such as a sausage funnel or a kibbeh attachment. The only major difference is if you’re okay with doing laborious work when you’re using a manual meat grinder.
Though manual meat grinders may be cheap, it would be a waste of money if you purchased one knowing you won’t have the patience and strength to work with them. Electric grinders save you a lot of time since they grind your meat faster. Manual meat grinders are for those who still enjoy doing the traditional way of grinding meat.
There is no right or wrong type of meat grinder. Just be sure to think it through whether or not you prefer to work fast or leisurely.
Material
There are different materials used in meat grinders. You’ll come across aluminum, stainless steel, and even plastic. Hands down, stainless steel is the most recommended one since it’s durable. The next one would be aluminum and then plastic.
But what comes with high-quality materials is also a hefty price. So expect to pay a little more for a stainless steel meat grinder than an aluminum one.
Quantity
How much meat do you plan in grinding regularly? If the answer to that is a lot then you might consider purchasing a meat grinder that’s built for heavy workloads.
Not all meat grinders can withstand grinding large batches of meat. The ones built for home use are usually perfect for just a few burgers and sausages. For commercial use, you might want to get a meat grinder that has a larger food tray capacity, stronger wattage and horsepower, and high-quality blades with different types of grinding plates.
You don’t want to overwork your grinder and lose a good investment all because you miscalculated on the quantity of meat grinding work you were planning to do.
Size And Weight
Meat grinders can come as a small compact kitchen appliance or a big one that can take up space. Usually, the heavier the meat grinder, the more it is built for heavy workloads. The lighter ones are mostly for home use.
If you have space in your home and wouldn’t mind displaying your kitchen grinder like how you display your microwave or coffeemaker, you may get a heavy-duty grinder. But if you’d like to be able to keep your meat grinder under kitchen cupboards or have it neatly tucked away in a small space on your counter, getting a compact one is recommended.
It will still boil down to the amount of workload you expect to do with a meat grinder rather than the size and weight of owning this kitchen appliance. However, it is still important to check your home where to put it aside, so it doesn’t clutter up your kitchen.
Capability
Are you going to use your meat grinder for simple burger patties and sausages? Or will you be using the grinder to grind up more than just meats such as bones? Raw feeders usually purchase meat grinders that can grind up large quantities of chicken bones to feed to their cats and dogs.
Knowing the capabilities of your meat grinder is very important. Some meat grinders are built to grind bones. Others will not be able to do so. Grinding bones up can be dangerous for your grinder if they’re not built for it. Not only will your blades get stuck but you might even damage the motor too and eventually overheat and destroy your grinder.
Read up on the capabilities of your grinder if they can take on bones. Check whether you need to pound the bones before feeding it into the grinder. This way, you’ll know what your grinder is built for before buying it.
Other grinders are also built for venison other than pork, beef, and chicken. If you’re planning to include grinding up deer meat, check if your grinder is also capable of doing this.
Attachments
A meat grinder is not just for patties. You can make sausages, kibbeh, and even cookies from a meat grinder. This is where the attachments come in. Meat grinders have attachments that allow you to work on different kinds of food depending on what you want.
Some meat grinders come with an attachment. Others only have a sausage funnel for when you want to make your own sausages. Check the meat grinder before buying it if it comes with all the attachments you need, so you don’t have to order them separately.
Dishwasher Safe
Be warned that not all parts of the meat grinder are dishwasher safe. Some don’t even allow it to be put inside the dishwasher. It’s common for meat grinders and its parts to be hand-washed and towel-dried.
Check the manual or ask the manufacturer how to clean the grinder. Also, ask about how to sanitize them properly after use since not all grinders can withstand hot water.
Function
Meat grinders have speed functions ranging from fast for when you want to grind meat and slow for when you want to stuff meat into sausage casings. There’s also a reverse function that helps unclog meat.
Read through and check your grinder before buying one to see which functions it has. Some grinders only have an on and off switch while others have a fast and slow function. Some grinders don’t even have a reverse function which makes it difficult for users to unclog meat.
Others
The most important buying guide tips are mentioned above. The following are just a few extra tips you might want to check out:
Now that you know all the factors you should check before buying a grinder appliance, you’re ready to own your first-ever meat grinder. With these tips and guides, you’ll be able to get started in making meatballs, meatloaves, burgers, sausages, cookies, kibbeh, and more!
FAQs About Meat Grinders
If you still have more questions about meat grinders, here are a few that might answer them.
1. How does a meat grinder work?
A meat grinder chops and minces raw meat. The reason why we need to do this is that certain dishes call for minced meat and you can’t always do this by hand and with a kitchen knife. It would be laborious to do so on your own and raw meat wouldn’t look fine and minced well if it didn’t come out from a meat grinder. That’s why meat grinders offer different sizes of grinding plates, so you can work on whichever is best for you.
How does a meat grinder work? Raw meat is fed into a funnel. The meat then goes through a screw conveyor powered electrically or manually by your hand. It breaks the meat down, so it can be cut up finely and easily. A blade at the end of it chops the meat which then goes through a grinding plate. The grinding plate’s size depends on how you want your meat to come out whether it would be fine, medium, or coarse in size.
It is recommended to cut up your meat into cubes and fed into the meat grinder frozen or half-frozen, so it retains its firmness when it comes out.
2. Can meat grinders grind bone?
Some meat grinders have the capabilities of grinding up bones. Others pound it up, so it becomes softer and easier for the appliance to grind. It is best to check with the manufacturer if the grinder you have or your planning to buy can grind up bones.
Some manufacturers might put a disclaimer that their appliance will not be able to grind up bones but reviewers say otherwise. To be safe, it’s best to follow the manufacturer’s warning.
3. Can you grind vegetables in a meat grinder?
Vegetables can be used on meat grinders. But certain meat grinders discourage people from doing this. Some meat grinders are built for meats only while other meat grinders may allow vegetables, fruits, and nuts to pass through their blades. As a precaution, read the manual and check what is and isn’t allowed to pass through your meat grinder.
4. Can a food processor be used as a meat grinder?
Not all food processors can function as a meat grinder. Some food processors don’t have strong blades to cut through meats, so it’s still recommended to invest in a meat grinder if you expect to be grinding up meat frequently.
Food processors also don’t have grinding plates for the chopped and minced meat to pass through, so it wouldn’t have that fine store-bought look if you do have a food processor that can cut through the meat. Likewise, food processors are not at all helpful if you’re into stuffing meats into your sausage casings.
5. Can my KitchenAid mixer function as a meat grinder?
KitchenAid mixers come with an attachment hub at the top. Through the years, the brand has been producing several attachments for their mixers and one of them is a meat grinder attachment.
If you have a KitchenAid, simply purchase a meat grinder attachment to transform it into a meat grinder. They may not be built for heavy workloads but it gets the job done for home use.
Are you ready to own your first-ever best meat grinder? Let us know which one you’re eyeing!
