Hamilton Beach Power Elite Review

The Hamilton Beach Power Elite is a fairly standard blender in a petite form. The 40-ounce glass jug is supported by a 700-watt motor housed in a small base, measuring just over 8.5 inches at its widest. Although it claims 12 blending functions, it only features four multi-functional buttons, which allow you to mix, puree, dice, and grind — the last two include a pulse function.

Smoothies

This petite blender has no issues blending a basic berry smoothie. Using the minute-long Smoothie preset, the blended mix was enjoyable but relatively thin and contained more seeds than comparable models we tested. It took a bit of mixing to help blend the Oreo milkshake — an effort hampered by the laughably small tamper hole, which is too small to fit any utensil — but the result was thick and creamy. Like most blenders in general and small blenders in particular, these common tasks are really what the Power Elite is designed to handle. But, oh, what a journey we had trying to blend a thicker green shake and a fruit, nut, and oat breakfast blend.

While the first few moments of blending a green smoothie seemed hopeless, gradually, a vortex formed to blend all of our fresh greens and frozen fruit. It ultimately produced a passable green shake with a surprisingly smooth texture despite its obvious chunkiness. Unfortunately, the Power Elite could not overcome the inertia of our notoriously thick fruit, nut, and oat recipe. The lack of liquid seriously hampered the blending of this mixture on any setting. We eventually added a cup of milk, which allowed it to blend into a thick but still rather enjoyable smoothie. This cemented that the Power Elite can handle hefty recipes, but unlike other more powerful blenders we tested, this one relies on liquids to pull the ingredients into a vortex that actually kickstarts the blending process.

Convenience

Even though the Power Elite is a simple, straightforward blender, it's not particularly convenient to use, especially compared to other models in our lineup. This blender features four presets — Mix, Puree, Dice, and Grind — which are also listed with their most common associated uses, like Mix for making a Milkshake or Puree for making a Smoothie. Despite the preset speeds, they don't have a timed cycle, so you have to babysit this blender while it's in use.

Fortunately, this blender is fairly straightforward to clean — a blessing, given that there are a number of small nooks and crannies, especially in the lid, that accumulate gunk rather quickly. There is an easy-to-use Clean button, but again, without a timer, you have to monitor its progress. Otherwise, the bottom of the pitcher and blades are removable for safe handwashing, and all parts are dishwasher safe. As a small blender, we were surprised by the sound the Power Elite created — an average reading of 84 decibels is on par with motors much larger and much more powerful than this one.

Ice

As far as crushing ice is concerned, the Power Elite did succeed in breaking a cup of ice cubes down into smaller ice chunks. However, the friction heat generated by the blades caused the ice to soften and melt, unlike other, more powerful blenders that are capable of pulverizing ice into chips. This may have been to the benefit of the Power Elite, which surprised us with its ability to mix a blended margarita using the Icy Drink preset. Our recipe was, admittedly, a bit too large for the small-capacity pitcher. However, we were very impressed with this petite blender's ability to hang in there and get the job done, turning out a batch of margaritas that was pleasant but not without room for improvement.

Pureeing

Like many of the budget blenders we tested, 'non-traditional' uses tend to be the downfall of these blenders, which just don't have the output power of the larger, more premium models. The Power Elite passed our nut butter test, but just barely, and the result will disappoint anyone who doesn't enjoy crunchy nut butter. Unfortunately, an attempt to puree homemade tomato soup was a complete disaster. We didn't expect a servable soup from a blender that was not designed for heating, but the ingredients were unblended, and the soup was unpalatable.

Grinding

The Power Elite fell even further behind the pack due to its inability to grind. While it could break up parmesan cheese into smaller blocks, none of the cheese was ground, nor was it anywhere near the powdered consistency we were aiming for. It was unsuccessful in turning granulated sugar into powder sugar, and we estimated it only milled five percent of the corn kernels into actual corn flour. Although this blender features a Grind preset, beware of its extremely limited capability.

Should You Buy the Hamilton Beach Power Elite?

In our assessments, we always look at the balance of price versus performance and award products for their durability and versatility. In the case of the Power Elite blender, you get what you pay for, which is not very much relative to the other blenders we tested, even the comparably priced ones. If you only want to make smoothies, then this blender is serviceable. Otherwise, it is well worth considering a small investment in a blender whose performance and capability are worth the expense.

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