Box and Other Hand-held Graters

[Dave the Cook]

To follow up: I found a Mouli on eBay and snapped it up. I have to admit that it does a bang-up job of grating. And it came in the sprightly orange, which, as everyone knows, has sharper discs than the beige version 😉.

 

 

It folds up pretty flat and stores comfortably. However, it's unwieldy for a quick shaving of parm, which was what we used the handheld grater for. So the Mouli will actually replace our box grater. To replace the handheld, we first tried the one lots of people (well, ATK and Wirecutter) rave about, the Rosle steel grater with wire handle (eG-friendly Amazon.com link). I didn't pay enough attention to the fact that it's nearly 16 inches long, which is just too damn big. In the end, we followed @lindag's advice and just got another Oxo. She's right, it's much sturdier than its predecessor --

 

 

--and comes in a color to match our new Mouli.

[weinoo]

28 minutes ago, Dave the Cook said:

And it came in the sprightly orange, which, as everyone knows, has sharper discs than the beige version

 

If you like a French carrot salad or celeri remoulade, it's fabulous for those as well.

[Smithy]

On 4/12/2022 at 4:22 PM, Dave the Cook said:

To follow up: I found a Mouli on eBay and snapped it up. I have to admit that it does a bang-up job of grating. And it came in the sprightly orange, which, as everyone knows, has sharper discs than the beige version 😉.

 

 

It folds up pretty flat and stores comfortably. However, it's unwieldy for a quick shaving of parm, which was what we used the handheld grater for. So the Mouli will actually replace our box grater. To replace the handheld, we first tried the one lots of people (well, ATK and Wirecutter) rave about, the Rosle steel grater with wire handle (eG-friendly Amazon.com link). I didn't pay enough attention to the fact that it's nearly 16 inches long, which is just too damn big. In the end, we followed @lindag's advice and just got another Oxo. She's right, it's much sturdier than its predecessor --

 

 

--and comes in a color to match our new Mouli.

 

Damn, Dave, you may start a run on these things. I see on eBay that the prices are all over the map. Did you get a sense of whether most still have good blades? Does a potential purchaser need to worry about dull blades on some of these previously-owned Moulis?

[Dave the Cook]

Dull blades was my primary concern. But I only paid $18, so it wasn't a huge risk.

 

To be honest, if not for the recommendation of people here (whose opinions I trust), and a dim positive-feeling recollection of the Mouli name, I would have dismissed it as a useless gadget. That's because--let's be truthful--it has a very gadget-like look to it. Because of that, I'm guessing most of these have spent the better part of their lives unused, hidden in the back of a drawer.

[Smithy]

2 minutes ago, Dave the Cook said:

Dull blades was my primary concern. But I only paid $18, so it wasn't a huge risk.

 

To be honest, if not for the recommendation of people here (whose opinions I trust), and a dim positive-feeling recollection of the Mouli name, I would have dismissed it as a useless gadget. That's because--let's be truthful--it has a very gadget-like look to it. Because of that, I'm guessing most of these have spent the better part of their lives unused, hidden in the back of a drawer.

 

The sad truth is that when we moved into our current house there was a blind corner in the kitchen cabinetry with something much like this that had fallen into the crevices and been left by the previous owners. I, er, didn't know what it was and threw it away. 

[JoNorvelleWalker]

My Mouli grater had rusted badly so I pitched it.  Possibly a mistake.  I'd worry about rust buying secondhand.

 

 

[blue_dolphin]

12 minutes ago, Smithy said:

 

Damn, Dave, you may start a run on these things. I see on eBay that the prices are all over the map. Did you get a sense of whether most still have good blades? Does a potential purchaser need to worry about dull blades on some of these previously-owned Moulis?

 

If the disks look nice and shiny in the photos then I don't think you need to worry about them being dull.  A lot of them seem to be unused and in the original boxes. Make sure to get one with 5 disks so you get the fine one that Dave pictured above.  

I bought mine for my first undergrad apartment kitchen so it has been in regular use for decades.  Some of the disks are less than shiny but I don't have any issues with them being too dull to crank out tons of cheese or carrots.    

 

I will say that the older, all metal ones like my mom had have a much smaller space for loading veg or cheese.  One might think the all-metal construction would be sturdier than the plastic but the small hopper is a negative. 

 

The plastic type like I have came in orange (as Dave and I have), beige (like @weinoo got) and white  I believe they perform equally. 

There was a newer white plastic model with a less angular, more curved shape that I heard was a lot less stable.  I think it also had only 3 disks. I'd avoid that.  

 

 

[weinoo]

25 minutes ago, Dave the Cook said:

Because of that, I'm guessing most of these have spent the better part of their lives unused, hidden in the back of a drawer.

I don't know if that's true in France 😉 .

[Smithy]

*bump* I love the Moulinex that I bought as a result of this topic!

 

 

 

An interesting thing about it is that the cheese shreds come off in long strands if the chunk of cheese being grated is long. It doesn't work that way with my box grater, because of the back-and-forth motion of my hand.

[rotuts]

@Smithy 

 

very excellent find .

 

Id suggest this :

 

take your time w your hand motion .

 

slower is better .

 

enjoy !

[weinoo]

9 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

The Moulinex is a pretty fun gadget too. Mine mysteriously disappeared years ago. 

 

I promise - it wasn't me...

 

 

 

 

ONe of the great inventions.  I first learned about it via one of David Lebovitz's recipes.

 

Edited 11 hours ago by weinoo (log)

[rotuts]

@weinoo

 

I ' had ' one of those .  ' Had '  i.e. no idea where it is now.

 

Fine design , but needed a bit more weight to it.

 

an , of course would be very nice w upgraded blades from Microplane.

[Katie Meadow]

58 minutes ago, weinoo said:

 

I promise - it wasn't me...

 

 

 

 

ONe of the great inventions.  I first learned about it via one of David Lebovitz's recipes.

 

Oh, so it WAS you! That looks exactly like mine!

[weinoo]

2 hours ago, rotuts said:

Fine design , but needed a bit more weight to it.

 

an , of course would be very nice w upgraded blades from Microplane.

 

A:  But then it would be a food processor. I have grated some fairly hard cheeses, and shredded both carrots and celeriac (two not exactly soft vegetables) quite easily.

 

B:  But then it would be a Microplane; I find the blades it comes with work just fine.

[blue_dolphin]

My Mouli-julienne was one of my first kitchen purchases for my college apartment.  I still have it, still use it regularly and it still works fine.  Quite a sturdy little thing.


My only repair has been to the plastic knob on the end of the crank which developed a hole that the crank poked through. I patched it up with a little Sugru. 

My mom had the all metal version with a wooden knob like this one:

[rotuts]

my mother also had the metal version .

 

in re thinking the one I used , I probably did not use it correctly .

 

I probably put too much downward pressure on the knob , missing the point that the work

 

was done in the horizontal  plane , not the vertical.

 

it was superseded by an early Cuisinart , which was a gift.

[weinoo]

Those all-metal versions were lovely, but I think they drastically improved the product with the addition of plastic and/or rubber on the feet to protect surfaces.

Edited 8 hours ago by weinoo (log)