My first blender was an Osterizer in the early seventies when I was in college. It was a good machine for drink blending, but was frustrating for foods. If you look closely at the Oster container, the blades sit in an area recessed from the main container. No problem for liquids, but semisolid things such as peanut butter will jam down in there. I found that I constantly had to use a spatula to help dressings, dips, etc. blend.

When the Kitchen Aid blender was first introduced, I bought one. It was a real disappointment from the start. No matter how much I ran items, they never got uniformly smooth! I can remember running canned tomatoes, for instance, for several minutes and still they did not puree evenly. I kept it for about 6 months and gave it to one of my employees.

Roughly 10 years ago I bought my first Waring, a one-speed bar blender. Finally I had a blender that did all I wanted! I think that the trademark cloverleaf Waring design is more than hype. It truly does pull food and heavy mixtures into the blades better than competing designs. If you look at the heavy Waring glass container with its nonremovable blades, you'll see that the bottom of the container is flat and the blades stand up above the bottom. I think this is why it works so well. Incidentally, I've found no problem whatsoever in not being able to take the blades out. Because of the design, a drop of d/w liquid and hot water cleans out the bottom in a second or two. However, the limitation with this machine for kitchen use was its lack of a low speed.

I bought a Cuisinart blender, then recently introduced, as I love my DLC-X food processor. Big mistake. The blender was made in China and was mostly plastic, frame and all. I burned it up making dips one New Year's Eve. Not for heavy duty use.

I bought the Waring kitchen model, like this one but with a different design of container with removable blades. I liked the machine but it didn't blend as well as my bar blender. Again, this seemed apparent due to the different container design. I returned it after three weeks.

Finally, I bought a two speed Waring laboratory model with timer, basically the same machine as shown here with a little different front. It has the original style container, a heavy duty motor, and has worked flawlessly for several years. I purchased the stainless steel container as an accessory, but still use the glass one most of the time. As any blender enthusiast will tell you, you only really need a low and a high speed, all the rest is window dressing.

The Waring is not only classic retro design, but its simple cylindrical base affords excellent ventilation for the motor. It also makes cleanup from spills and overflows much simpler than more elaborate models. Incidentally, you can find the heavy glass containers all the time for a buck or two at local flea markets; order new blades and lid for a fraction of the purchase price of a new set!

This is a classic kitchen design that will remain in style for many, many more years to come.

188 of 193 found the following review helpful:

Commercial grade blender  Jun 22, 2000
By M. Gibbens "rrunyett"
This is the same blender that my friend bought for his smoothie business and it does the job very well. It liquifies practically everything that you ask it to including fruit pieces and ice chunks. Even the ice is chipped into a fine mix without some of the bigger chunks left over that you might find in the bottom of other less expensive brands. Bottom line is that its function is the best out there.

100 of 100 found the following review helpful:

Exceptional Blender  Jul 08, 2001

The Waring Professional Bar Blender is all the blender I will ever need. Smoothies are now easy to whip up and a snap to clean up. To top it off, the stainless steel model I purchased looks great on the countertop. The motor (390 watts) has plenty of power for crushing ice and making frothy drinks. Waring blenders exude high quality.

Certainly there are more powerful blenders. Vita-Mix and Waring's Mega Pro are two such examples. Nevertheless, one would be hard pressed to justify the added expense of either machines for the average home. Kitchen Aid puts out a slightly more powerful blender (500 watts). But I have used both and for my money, Waring produces more consistent results for a wide variety of blending applications.

The cloverleaf glass jar is sturdy and easy to clean. I had some reservations about buying glass with a stainless steel version available but to my surprise, I actually prefer it. It is often necessary to have the contents visable(not possible with the steel jar) while blending to ensure a consistently smooth texture or to prevent overblending.

I recommend this product highly.

85 of 86 found the following review helpful:

Much better than the Kitchenaid  Aug 15, 2004
By jsprag
I had a Kitchenaid blender quit on me(second time with the same problem) and found out that they have changed the style and don't make replacement parts for my model. I would have had to buy an entire new blender. From the looks of it, they didn't make the new ones any more robust so I decided to look at other brands. Stumbled across Waring and did a little research. Found out that Waring sells every part for every blender that it has made in the last 60 years. That level of support combined with the favorable reviews led me to take the plunge. After eleven weeks with my new blender, here are my observations:

Noise - I think this one is slightly quieter than my Kitchenaid and definitely quieter than my parents old Oster. Even so, don't plan on trying to watch TV or carry on a conversation with the thing running. Luckily it does it's job pretty quick.

Cleanup - FAR better than the kitchenaid. No disassembly required; just put some hot water and a little dish soap in and run it a few seconds. Rinse and you're done. Dishwasher safe if you feel like it too. Kitchenaid has the jar, lid, jar base, blade assembly, and gasket to fool with. Lots of crevices for food to get stuck in.

Performance - Simply a better performing blender. Blends drinks to a much smoother consistency with no big ice chunks left behind. With the Kitchenaid I frequently had to pop the lid off and give things a stir to get them mixed up and worked down to the blades. I rarely have to do that with the Waring. I don't have anything scientific to back this up, but I think it is a matter of geometry. The Kitchenaid is a wide, squat jar where the contents seem to be able to find refuge from the whirling blades. The Waring is taller & skinnier and it seems that nothing gets away from the blades. The Waring has only two speeds while the Kitchenaid had five, but I don't really miss them at all. I haven't found anything the Kitchenaid could do that the Waring can't do at least equally well.

Durability - The problem I had with the Kitchenaid was the blade assembly. The metal "gear" on the bottom is a press fit onto the shaft that connects to the blade. When this loosens up (such as when an ice cube jams up the blade) there is no way to repair it. New assembly costs about $15. If the Waring had a similar failure, the thing does come apart, the replacement part is about $4, and it is widely available. Other than this, they both seem to be durable and rugged. The glass jars on both are thick and sturdy, and they really give the blender some mass.

So far I've had my blender 11 weeks and have been using it mostly to make frozen drinks and milkshakes. The Waring is by far superior to the blender it replaced. It looks great, performs nearly perfect, and comes from a company with an excellent reputation and parts support. Can't ask for much more than that.

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