Can I Use a Spinner for Pasta & Grease? - Help Quick!

[yoyo284]

I need help quick! I have a customer who wants to know if she can use her spinner for pasta and for getting excess grease out of cooked hamburger. I have no idea. Would the heat melt the baskets?

 

[esavvymom]

I've used it for pasta. Never tried it for hamburger. Since it's dishwasher safe, I doubt it would melt- assuming she's rinsing both to get the extra starch (pasta) and grease (meat) off.So I don't see why it couldn't! Definitely is worth the money- just in the money saved on produce alone in my house!!

 

[ChefBeckyD]

The slots are too big for ground beef or spaghetti. It would fall through. I do use mine for larger pasta shapes - like Rotini for pasta salad. It works great to get the water out, so that you don't have watery pasta salad!Unless she did what I do for frozen spinach....lay a couple paper towels in the basket, and then put in the meat, and spin. The paper towels soak up the liquid.The usual method for removing excess grease from ground beef is to rinse it - and for that, I would recommend the new stainless colander set.

 

[zmom58]

I have spun the excess grease out of my 93% lean ground beef (no grease came out of it when I drained it). And there were no particles of beef in the bowl afterwards. I got 1/4 cup of fat (and probably some juices too). You could see the fat, it was yellow (good ole Iowa corn-fed beef!). I was really amazed. I have shared this at my shows too. Now, if you chop it super fine with your mix 'n chop, then maybe you might get some particles of ground beef, but all in all it works great.
Deb

 

[Intrepid_Chef]

Pasta: YES, esp. if you are doing Rigatoni, rotini or anything but spaghetti. The hot water will not damage the collander. (Got that answer from the test kitchens at HO.Ground beef: Personally, I would not reccomend it, esp. if the meat is fatty. Not only b/c of the issue of the meat coming through the grates (you can fix that issue by lining the basket with a paper towel) but because I personally don't like that much grease gumming up the works. I also don't like the idea of putting hot grease in ANYTHING plastic.