Hamilton Beach Eclectrics 50111 All-Metal 500-Watt Countertop Blender

I internet shopped for a week, reading consumer reports and customer reviews of just about every blender made. I decided on this one based on my research and I am glad I did. I make my husband fruit and juice smoothies almost every day after work and with this machine it is a fast, easy job. Ice and frozen fruit are blended into the drink very quickly.

It is a little loud but it is worth the noise to have 500 watts of power. I also like the fact the base is heavy cast metal, the pitcher is thick, solid glass with a tight fitting lid and the blade is stainless. I like the easy to use control knob and the fact it has 2, yes just 2 speeds. I find most machines with 12 to 20 little buttons are fairly useless and all those speeds rarely used, they also take up more counter space because the bases have to be bigger for all the buttons.

The fact that the Hamilton Beach comes in 6 colors is just icing on the cake and the Moroccan Red is gorgeous.

This powerful and sylish blender replaced an old 12 speed Oster which had me grumbling with every use. Two of the primary selection factors were the fact it was NOT an Oster and the wide-based glass pitcher.

I've used this blnder to date to whirr together protein breakfast smoothies, make soup, and mix seasoning rub. It worked well, evenly distributing the contents quickly, and pureeing squash soup to silky smoothness. I like the pulse feature on this model, and feel two speeds is all I need. I have not used this blender to chop ice, and I use fresh or partially thawed fruit for my smoothies, so I cannot speak to that feature.

I especially like the glass pitcher, which is wider near the blades, easing cleaning. This also seems to help distribute protein powder better than the old Oster, although that is sort of like saying a gasoline lawn mower is more effective than pruning shears to mow the lawn.

The plastic cover seems less wimpy than the...Read more

Nice, retro design- really great colors (I opted for the apple green). My only wish is that it were a bit more powerful. It is perfect for making smoothies, which was why I bought it.
...UPDATE...one person asked if this blender will crush ice by itself. It will not.