Vitamix Explorian Blender

This machine does everything excellently. I am very satisfied!!

It’ll truly grind the bones of your enemies if necessary. My son is G-tube fed, so I blend all of his nutrition. This liquefies everything from beef roast, to raw veggies including carrots, and berries with seeds or tricky skins. I’ve never strained a single blend, and they’re all as smooth as velvet.

Only con is noise. It’s definitely not too loud, but if you’re trying to be sneaky in the morning and make a quick smoothy, maybe this isn’t your machine.

It’s easy to clean, comes with a wand to push down the ingredients, and hasn’t given a bit of struggle with anything. Im AMAZED! Also, I recommend getting a blender spatula, like a small squeegee.

Skip the cute looking Ninja or Cuisinart blenders, and buy this. Worth every cent!

Honestly, if you told me this was a brand new product, I would have no doubt it’s true. I couldn’t spot any indication of it being refurbished.

I wrestled with justifying such a big splurge, when my ancient blender still did just fine for most stuff (it’s the only blender I’ve purchased previously, and I paid exactly $1 for it at the thrift store 25 years ago, glass jar and all), but the Black Friday deal swayed me. I wanted an upgrade for more versatility, but couldn’t see spending decent money on a Ninja, with so many negative ratings for reliability.

Like so many others, I can’t believe I waited this long! I never thought an appliance would make me so happy, but the Vitamix truly draws you into all its fury and potential. Even the self-cleaning is fun, aerating soap to the point where the tiny bubbles want to cling to the sides during rinsing.

Looking through the included recipe book, I was surprised to see rice milk, which can be a sizable cost and will quickly contribute to the Vitamix paying for itself. (Rookie pro tip: 2 cups water + 1 cup cooked rice is a bit vague, as one would expect a rice measurement to be pre-cooked. I tried it that way first and it was way too thick. 1 cup pre-cooked needs 5-6 cups of water blended in for a reasonable consistency. After some experimentation, I’ve settled on 6 cups of water & 6 spoonfuls of brown sugar, plus a splash of vanilla extract. Blend it longer than seems necessary, to get a smoother texture. Refrigerate it overnight, and preferably a full day, for it to thicken up nicely. Basmati is nice, but Jasmine is a real treat.)

I was excited to try making hummus, and while it did turn out well, I probably won’t be doing it again. The thick mixture overheated my Explorian a couple times and required an annoyingly long wait to cool down enough to resume. While waiting on that, I read a few things of interest: 1) thick mixtures like nut butters and hummus usually have that problem, 2) it takes 45-60 minutes to sufficiently cool the blender down, and 3) there’s a trick to dramatically lessen the time of #2. Once it cools just enough to run, crank it up to high speed with no container in place. That’ll get the fan running at maximum speed, and with no load on the motor, will cool it down in a minute or so.

Also, the reason for blending stuff on the highest speed, as it turns out, isn’t for the blending so much as for the cooling. Fan speed is tied to motor speed. I’m a little surprised Vitamix didn’t find a way to un-link the two and allow the fan to either always run either at max speed, or independently variable speeds by heat dissipation demands.

The built-in cord storage is a nice touch, looping around below the base instead of sticking off the back like most. Also, the cord is what you would expect to see on a high power shop tool, or a 10-14 ga extension cord. It’s way meatier than that of most appliances, and hints at how much build quality goes into these blenders. It’s weird that the high end blenders all use plastic jars nowadays, but I guess people are obsessed with blending ice (a total mystery to me; just get crushed ice or stick whatever it is in the fridge after) and need that extra layer of shatter-proof protection?

Everyone raves about the tamper, but until you start playing with it and realize the purpose of the removable center cap, it doesn’t fully sink in how useful it is. The lid itself is somewhat difficult to remove, probably as a safety measure with how much pressure is created by those blades of fury.

I just love my Vitamix!!!
There’s only one thing I would have liked to know before I bought it though. Here it is :
When you buy your Vitamix, you can choose between the 48 or 64 oz container. I choose 64 mainly because it was the cheapest option when it came to what was available in the refurbished models. But now, I realize that it’s actually a bit of a problem. Since I live alone, if I make, for example hummus, I’ll absolutely have to use 2 cans of chickpeas in my 64 oz container. I’d rather use only one can, since I’m on my own, but I can’t. I tried and it not blend properly one can of chickpeas. Because the base of the container is so large, there was not enough food and it just got stuck under the blade. This is actually stated in the recipe booklet you get with the Vitamix, the book providing different hummus recipes depending on the type of container you own. It’s the same for anything else, be it cashew cream, smoothies , sauces… You cannot blend food if it does not at least amount to a cup and a half once blended. If you try with less, big chunks are going to remain. It’s still really good for smoothies because I usually make 2-cup-sized smoothies (A regular Mason jar in 500ml, which = 2 cups). But yeah, you couldn’t make a small smoothie in the 64 oz container. So, in conclusion, the 64 oz container is not very well suited for people cooking for only themselves. You’ll either get crappy results, or you’ll have to double your servings.

In all my life I never thought I would be writing a review for a blender. But after having this Vitamix for several weeks, using it about every day. I wanted to share my opinions for anyone in a similar situation.

First off, I will say that my wife and I make smoothies for our breakfast Monday through Friday. So our blenders get a workout. Our first blender was a standard Black and Decker, we quickly wore it out. We replaced it with an upgrade to the basic Ninja blender. And we were happy with it for 5 years, mostly. We knew about Vitamix, but figured it would be a case of diminishing returns. How much more blender could you get? $100 for the Ninja seems like enough money. But after wearing it out with 5 years of consistant use, it was literaly smoking when my wife made a smoothie one morning. We decided it might be worth it to spend a little more money.

And that’s where we are. I will be comparing this Vitamix to the base Ninja (I noticed a lot of people were in my situation when I was researching brands, so I thought this might help). Scroll to the bottom for a TL/DR.

First off, POWER!!!! UNLIMITED POWER!!! at least until 10. The controls on this Vitamix are simple enough. There is a pulse switch, and a switch On/Off. Then a speed dial that goes to 10 (I’m waiting for the Spinal Tap version that goes to 11). The manufacturers suggest flipping it on at 1 and dialing it up to the preferred speed. Kinda feels like operating a spaceship, going into hyperspace. I rarely need to go above 7, but it can easily handle ludicrous speed (also known as 10). And even at the fastest speeds the base doesn’t move and stays on the counter. The Ninja had a tendancy to dance off the counter if you didn’t hold on to it. As stated earlier, I make smoothies. And this thing performs in that, silky smooth smoothies from the first time I used it. Comparatively the Ninja had good days and bad, but could never puree frozen fruit as well (lots of little chunks). I will note that for the first week or so the Vitamix had an ozone type smell while being operated, it was a little alarming at first but faded after repeated use.

Second, cleaning. Now I work at home, where as my wife runs off to the rat races of a 9-5 day. So I clean the smoothie mess most days. And I really know about cleaning the Ninja, the blade comes right out and is sharp. I had it fall off the counter once and luckly betrayed my instinct to try to catch it. Plus even with the dish soap warm water and pulsing trick. I still had to scrub the fragments of fruit, and the grommet where the blade fit in the pitcher had to be cleaned with a tiny wire brush regularly or it got moldy. Needless to say, I hated cleaning the Ninja. But now I move to the Vitamix, and this machine was made to clean everyday. The blade is fixed, so nothing to clean there. You just fill it up halfway with warm water and put in a squirt of dish soap, run it on high for about 60 seconds and pour out and rinse. Only rarely do I have to scrub off bits of fruit, and then it’s typically only on the spout or drips on the outside. The fitting on the bottom has a little hole for water to run out if you dry it upside down, small thing but nice touch. Simply put, I don’t mind cleaning the Vitamix.

And finally the noise level. I heard people complain about this. Now the Ninja was like a jet engine starting up, I live on a busy street so I don’t mind noise. But the Ninja had such a high pitched whine that it irritated the tiny bones in my inner ear. But the Vitamix on the other hand, is relatively quiet. I wouldn’t record a band with it running in the background, unless it was an experimental album. But the Vitamix is not irritating in the least. Just a steady lower WHIRRRRR!!!! But as I stated earlier with the power, you don’t need to run it that long anyway. And I will state with my full confidence. It is the quietest blender I have ever used.

So for my TL/DR conclusion. This entry level Vitamix blend was worth every penny I spent on it. And I was very skeptical. I have heard the models higher than this are even better, if this one ever conks out on me (in a reasonable amount of time of course). I will likely check out the higher levels. But for now, I would give the Vitamix Explorian my top marks. And a noticable upgrade from your standard entry level blender (that’s a thing right?).