Customer Reviews

Black & Decker FP1500 Power Pro II food processor

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(24)

 

 

When I went shopping for a food processor, I passed on the low-slung, low wattage belt-drive models. True, all I'm mainly doing is prepping veggies and meats before combining them in a slow cooker but I don't enjoy replacing cheapie small appliances on a regular basis. I prefer to get the best I can afford, instead of saving money on a throw-away gadget.

The Black & Decker FP1500 has a much more substantial look and feel than the rest of the B&D line. Although the specifications don't mention whether it uses belt-drive (bad), gear drive (better) or direct drive (best), the shape and the weight distribution of the base unit suggest it's one of the latter pair. The clincher for me, aside from its power and capacity, were those 5 magical words: "Removable parts are dishwasher safe."

The FP1500 isn't the quietest food processor on the counter, compared to those whispering workhorses from the likes of KitchenAid, Robot-Coup and, to a lesser extent, the latter-day Cuisinart line. But it also doesn't drain your checking account or credit card limit of 3 to 5 C-Notes. As a quick chopper, slicer and mincer, it's ideal and looks like it'll last a long time. Though it's not really up to, say, weekly batches of bread dough, a dough mixing blade is included. For about a quarter the price of a set of fancy knives, it'll get you through food preparation tasks quickly and, unlike those knives, it cleans up in the dishwasher.

This Black & Decker food processor is a truly great kitchen device. It's as good as a Cuisinart model, for a fraction of the cost. I've used it to make pesto, puree soups, blend herbed butters and many other tasks. It does these jobs with gusto and ease, and offers a pulse speed- a slower mode that is good for gentler mixing/chopping, and a high speed that will really chop things up. There is a food chute which allows you to add ingredients or liquids while processing without splattering stuff all over the place. Have you ever cut your fingers accidentally on a razor-sharp processor blade? That will never happen with this model because in a very intelligent design decision, the cutting blade is serrated! It is more than sharp enough to cut/blend when turned on, but you cannot cut yourself on it when you handle the blade. Very smart move and much appreciated by this chef. With a ten-cup capacity, the processor is large enough to hold plenty of liquid/food. Clean-up is a breeze- just twist the bowl off, remove the top and soak in hot water and soap. The machine comes with a dough-mixing attachment, which I haven't used yet. Highly recommended.

[1] *ONLY* reason we gave this 4 instead of 5 stars is that for some strange reason there appears to be no way to close the open top of the food chute, which is built into the bowl lid & is non-removable. Not a problem at all for me -- I simply hover a little plastic dish over the open chute 'just in case' when processing something fairly liquidy. But this could possibly annoy someone else, I suppose.

[2] The processor seems to hold *rather more* than the stated 10 cups, but this could be due to the really nice, wide-open, high-lidded design of the bowl & top. Both of the metal blades for chopping/ shredding/ cutting/ etc do an excellent job on a vast variety of foods. The pulse feature is superb -- just one or two pulses actually yields *real food* not *baby paste*!

[3] The dough mix blade is a handy feature if you frequently make light-dough, smallish batches of bread-cookies-etc. Very good results 'cutting' butter & flour into each other for pastry -- MUCH better than the iffy ole two-knife & other methods. Haven't tried the dough blade for any of my heavy-dough or multi-loaf recipes, though. The processor seems large enough & powerful enough to handle most of them -- it's the smallish flattish plastic dough blade itself I'm a bit concerned about. Could be I'm just too accustomed to the large metal traitional-shape dough hooks on my bowl-type kneader-mixer, and the 'known results' using it on heavy big batches.

[4] As an earlier review mentioned, there's just no need for the average ordinary home cook to pay hundreds for a food processor when there's THIS one, especially at the Amazon price. This was an anniversary gift to us from a friend, and unfortunately he did not buy it here (we knew from the return slip which of course didn't have the purchase price, then later we happened to come upon the processor by accident in the actual kitchen store -- ouch -- please do consider buying it here instead).

I rated this food processor after receiving back in January with 4 stars. It is a nice food processor, when it works! I had to ship it back to B&D in June for a replacement since the motor burned out on it. Mind you I only used it sparingly and had probably only used it 6-8 times when that happened. Now here we are in September and I burned out the motor on the replacement model after using it only ONCE! And I'm not grinding meat here, I'm just chopping veggies. The company has been great at sending a replacement, but this time I'm hoping they refund my money because the food processor isn't worth a dime if it's not reliable and I have to ship it back every few months. Next time I'll spend more and get a name brand you can trust!

I used this food processor for 3 times only and never exceeded half of the capacity and still it broke!!!! it seems that there have been many complaints about the same problem: gear problems. i.e. the motor spins but the blade doesn't. I opened the machine and found out that the gear is made of plastic!!! it was all rubbed.
I don't recommend this product at all.

I don't know much about food processors, but I really like this one. I bought it to make baby food, but have used it for many other things. It works really well, and will chop even small amounts of veggies (it even chopped bell pepper which many food processors turn to pulp). I highly recommend this product if you don't want to spend [a lot of money] for one. It is also very easy to clean.

I bought this as a gift two years ago after the reviews here, and Consumer Reports rated it a good buy. It's good at first, but I've had hamsters that lived longer! The shredding blade broke on the second use. After about the 6th or 7th use, some kind of black material started flying out of the bottom, and then it died, with the mysterious burnt plastic smell everyone talks about. I'm amazed there hasn't been a recall and I'm disappointed that B&D would sell such a poor quality product. Just bought a new Cuisinart at Costco. Spent more, but it is OUTSTANDING!

My first food processor was a Cuisinart with about four million little pieces. I hated it and figured fancy kitchen gadgets weren't for me. However, over time I realized that a serious cook really should have some sort of electronic machine to help out with chopping. I mean, there's only so much you can do with a blender and a knife. After reading several reviews I finally settled on the Black and Decker FP1500. It's relatively inexpensive ....it has a small number of detachable parts (which are dish-washer safe, another plus), the blades are very sharp, and it can whip up salsa in about 5 seconds. That's the only caution, really, that if you are not already food processor savvy, you will have instant pulp before you know it. And that's actually also a plus. Anyone still hesitating over buying a food processor, and I can completely relate to that, is strongly encouraged to try this one. It's excellent.

One of the big reasons why you buy a processor w/ a higher power output is to knead dough--and this machine is not designed well for that specific task. The dough blade is stubby plastic that allows much of the "capacity" to be wasted, with flour pooling underneath it. Also, the wet dough at the top spills up through the dough blade, out of the center, and then leaks under the bowl! What a mess. The motor starts to stink like burned-rubber-effort if you knead for more than one minute. And finally, the dough paddle is IMPOSSIBLE to clean on the inside (after it's gotten all that leaked dough up and inside it). This machine is powerful enough, and thus makes a good batch of pesto, but is badly designed.

I received my food processor for Christmas. I had noticed the same processor at a different store that came with a bonus blade for fine shredding. I decided to see if I could buy accessories for mine online. I could not find any accessories or replacement parts for the Power Pro II. I was concerned about the number of unfavorable reviews I came across during my search. Despite the numerous negative comments concerning the motor going out, I decided to keep it. I used it for the first time tonight to make a sauce and was only halfway finished when it stopped working! I strongly recommend NOT purchasing this food processor!