In our current age of social media racket, trends and hacks come and go at a dizzying pace—some of them are worth trying (see here and here), some of them most certainly are not. This week’s example in the definitely-not-worth-it category: Using an immersion blender to grind spices and coffee beans. The technique involves turning an immersion blender upside down, adding a small amount of spices or coffee beans to the bowl-shaped blade-guard, covering the blade-guard with a piece of plastic wrap, then letting it blitz.
We get it, novelty is appealing, and the idea that there’s a whole world of untapped potential hidden in your stick blender is almost thrilling. Could this be a totally new way to grind coffee and spices? Common sense says no—at best it’s a new way to send yourself to the ER! But in the name of science (and for the fun of popping stupid hack bubbles every chance we get), we decided to give it the good ol’ college try.
The Test
Serious Eats / Yasmine Maggio
To take my stick blender for a grinding spin, I gathered the requisite appliance along with some whole coffee beans and coriander seeds and set myself up at the island in my kitchen. With my phone camera set up on a tripod right in front of me, I was ready for action.
I poured 1.5 tablespoons of the coffee beans into my plugged-in immersion blender before wrapping the plastic wrap around the top, as so many of the videos going around Instagram and TikTok have shown. I hit the “on” button and coffee beans instantly flew to every corner of my kitchen (and I really mean every corner; I’m sure we’ll be finding them for days to come). While I was skeptical about this “technique” of grinding beans going in, I was shocked by how quickly it all went to hell. In the end, I could only laugh (and I laughed a lot).
Undeterred, I tried this trick a second time with coffee beans and then another two times with whole coriander seeds. The results were uniformly disastrous. So what should you take from all of this? It’s not even a little bit worth using your immersion blender to grind coffee beans or spices, and not just because of mess. Here are all the reasons that make it a dumb idea, in detail.
It’s Messy
After failing with the first round of beans, I blamed myself, figuring that I hadn’t wrapped the plastic wrap tightly enough around the blender (which was frustratingly hard to do with my other hand balancing the immersion blender) and that I must not have held securely enough to the plastic wrap during blending to keep it affixed. I decided I needed a bigger piece of plastic wrap (ah, the waste! But we’ll get to that later) and would need to hold it closer to the top of the stem, near the bowl of the immersion blender, so there was no way for the beans to break free. But when I tried again, the coffee beans were so eager to escape the bowl of the immersion blender once it was turned on that they ended up cutting through the plastic wrap and making another mess, albeit a smaller one this time around (lucky me!). The same thing happened with the coriander, sending coriander dust flying everywhere.
Serious Eats / Yasmine Maggio
While the testing left me cursing the internet, it proved a valuable point: An immersion blender is not meant to be used in this way. It’s not designed to contain dry foods nestled in its little cup-like blade guard, and there’s no way to ensure you won’t make a disaster of your kitchen in the process.
It’s Unsafe
My specific instructions from Daniel when attempting this method were “DO NOT TOUCH THE BLADE,” (all caps, via Slack, so there was no misunderstanding his direction and concern for my safety). I thought this part was obvious. Clearly, I know not to touch the blade. But when I sent Daniel my videos of the test, he freaked out, still in all-caps: « YOU TOUCHED THE BLADE AND YOU DIDN’T EVEN REALIZE IT!!!! » Turns out, after I added my spices to the blender cup, I quickly used my finger to move a few that had landed on the blades, not aware of the danger of touching the business end of the plugged-in immersion blender even when it is turned off.* One slip of my finger with the “on” button and I would’ve ended up in the ER, which was Daniel’s initial worry when he first heard of this trend; an immersion blender is not designed for this kind of use and it’s simply unsafe.
Did I put my life at risk to teach you all a lesson? Yes, I did, and you should be grateful!!
[*Editor’s note: This exact mistake has sent former SE colleagues Kenji and Niki to the ER. It happens all the time.]
It’s Not Practical
If it weren’t so messy and dangerous, this trick might make some tiny amount of sense for spices since it’s not uncommon for a recipe to call for just a small amount of freshly ground spices. But the amount of coffee that you get from this method isn’t even enough to pull a single shot of espresso.
Either way, there’s nothing the immersion blender has to offer here that a spice or coffee grinder or small mortar and pestle can’t give you. In fact, you’re better off with a grinder so you can control the size of the grind—and if you’re grinding your beans fresh, we suspect you’re the type of person who cares about grind size too, so you likely already have a dedicated coffee grinder.
It’s Wasteful
We know you probably don’t need a lecture about reducing waste in the kitchen, and we admit we call for using plastic wrap when it’s the best option in a recipe, but why waste a piece of plastic wrap every time you want to grind spices or coffee beans—especially when you’re wasting it on a technique that doesn’t work? Perhaps worse than wasting single use plastic is the food waste, since I didn’t get any usable ground coffee or spices out of this whole exercise.
The Verdict: 5/5 on the Stupid Hack Scale
Overall, the margin for error (and injury) (and mess) is high with this hack, so you’re better off just using a spice or coffee grinder for all of your grinding needs. We’re not sure how this trend made its rounds in the first place. But, hey, whatever, it just gave us a chance to, once again, prove the internet wrong!
