I have both the Vitamix and the 16 cup Cuisinart, and I do not think that it is overkill. They are both incredible machines with different purposes. The Vitamix is the ultimate blender and can puree anything. I would not buy the grain container as you can grind grains in the regular container. If you wanted to start serious grain baking, you would need a mill.

The Cuisinart can chop, slice, grate, etc... You may want to check Costco...they have the 12 c Cuisinart for $150. I think that the 12 c .is a great size. There is no need to spend the extra on the 16 c unless you need the extra capacity..

Some may say that it is overkill to have the 2 machines, but I would not want to be without either of them.

A food processor has been in regular use in my household since I first purchased one in 1982. I enjoy using those machines, which may or may not be true for you. My current favorite is the Magimix with the wide feed tube. While I've had blenders longer, they've not received as much use. I used a processor for baby food, and later for baby food for the grandkids. There are posters here who give their commercial grade blenders a real workout on a regular basis, so take my experience as not necessarily representative. I will say that during the years when I was a vegetarian--eons ago, as a teenager-- a blender would have been more useful. Even so, I never really felt that I could justify adding one of those mega powerful versions to my array of counter top appliances. (Our Waring Pro blender gets pressed into duty for crepe batter and, during the peak of summer, for Margaritas, mostly, and not much else. LOL.)

I agree with breadandsuch, we have both a vitamix and a cuisinart and I love them both. They do different things. For example EVERY morning I use the vitamix to make hot coco for my son - it heats and blends so i don't have to heat water/milk up on stove or in microwave. I use the food processor to slice/dice and such. To give you an example, I was too lazy to get my cuisinart from under my counter to make hummus, I figured I could make it in the vitamix. Big mistake, didn't come out right and it was a pain to clean. Therefore, get both. Indeed my cuisinart is over 20 years old and still runs great (I guess I got my money's worth).

We have both a Vitamix and an 11-cup Cuisinart. Our Vitamix is well over five years and it still works like a charm. We mainly use our Vitamix to make smoothies, but we have made soups and salsa in the past. Never once have we regretted purchasing it, but we also make a lot of smoothies and purees.

We recently upgraded to an 11-cup Cuisinart and we love it. We use it to chop, slice, shred, and knead dough. We often cook dishes that require a lot of finely shredded/chopped veggies, so the Cuisinart reduces our prep time.

For us, having both machines is not overkill. We use them both on a regular basis, so they were well worth the cost and the cupboard space.

I have a really old Cuisinart DLC-7, which I use for chopping and processing, a Waring blender for smoothies, and recently added a stick blender which is terrifically handy for pureeing soups in the pot on the stove. I really do use then all and feel I need them all!

how do you make hot chocolate in your vitamix?
that sounds ideal, i make it often and make a mess just as often.

Baby food making is a six month endeavor. By 1 year old my daughter ate table food fine as long as it was soft enough and cut small enough. I made her food in a food processor and it was fine.

I have a blendtec and I love it. It is the Vitamix's competitor and I think its comparably priced. I decided to get the blendtec because it is shorter than the Vitamix and therefore can sit on my counter, under upper cabinets. I don't think the Vitamix will on a countertop, under an upper cab, so you might want to plan where you are going to put it.

I love the Blendtec and we used it daily for smoothies. I also use it to puree veg for soups. Love it, a great investment that encourages healthy eating. If I had to choose between getting the blender or the food processor, I'd choose the blender.

Of course I've never had a food processor. But I feel I can chop and slice whereas I cannot blend the way my blendtec can.

Enjoy your purchase, whatever you decide.

I use my Vitamix all of the time for smoothies, soups breadcrumbs, pesto all sorts of things. We like the taco soup recipe that came with it too. It is on my counter and I have to tilt it to get it out from the molding under the upper cabinets, but it is quick and easy.

I love my Cuisinart too, but since it is in a lower appliance cabinet requiring me to haul it out & put it together, I use it infreguently. I use to use it primarily to make pesto, but found I can make that in the Vitamix too.

Stick blenders are a must IMHO, but for gravies and sauces. I do not use them for cream soups as it is impossible to get a lump-free consistency for larger quantities. I replaced a plastic version with a good stainless steel one and have been very happy with it. I think that might be made by Cuisinart too.

While you may not be making frozen cocktails much these days, buy for the long term. Once the baby is older, you could be making lots of non-alcoholic smoothies for your growing family.

I have and use both also. The vitamix is better for smoothly pureeing / blending larger quantities of liquidy stuff. Small amounts and chunky stuff get caught in the bottom and the cuisinart is better for more creamy or chunky things like pesto or hummus.

I do pesto and frozen drinks in the blender (Oster) and everything else in the food processor.
When our sons were babies, I had a cheap fp that made all their food. Now, I have the KA wide mouth fp and love it to death. It gets a workout almost every day in our house. I don't bake as much any more, but when I do, it has taken over from my stand mixer. I would be lost without it at this point. I love to cook big batches of things, and so to chop onions, carrots, celery, etc... in a jiffy is wonderful. I grate cheese in it. It slices cucumbers for a cucumber salad in seconds and they come out so nice and thin. Breadcrumbs are so easy. I put my chopped meat into it after cooking it one big slab and it comes out perfect for tacos or chili. I make it in large doses and freeze in zip locks, so the cleanup is less often and I have it handy in the freezer on nights I am rushing.
I use it for bruschetta, but not the tomatoes. Those don't do well getting smashed in there. I mix all the rest of the ingredients and add that to the tomatoes by hand. It works really well for hummus.
For baking, it is simply wonderful. Creaming butter and sugar is easy and so is mixing all but the toughest dough.
I have the large capacity one, so I can usually make a double batch of anything in it just fine.
I would do without everything but my mw, toaster and fp for the small appliances.
I think smoothies and such are something people do for a while and then lose interest. We have our regular blender for that, but we rarely use it. Margaritas are much nicer than smoothies anyway, lol.....

I don't have either and covet both. I say if you have use for both, have space for both and can get them at a good deal go for it! Definitely not overkill. You're right that there are overlapping features, but each also has it's own purposes that cannot be achieved with the other.

I've made plenty of baby food, however, without either. My favourite for pureeing for baby is the hand/stick blender. I never made my own rice cereal though. Might have, I suppose, if it had been easily achieved with a small appliance! Do keep in mind, as one other has mentioned, that you'll only need to puree food for baby for a VERY short time in the scheme of things. (Depending on how many you intend to have I suppose). Overall if it were me making the decision I would try to think longer term about which one I'd use more in the long run and not just about the baby food. The pureeing really is over before you know it!

Hi fallingwaters. My son is actually 17 is 5'6" and weights 105. So, here is how I make him hot chocolate. I take a bottle of ensure plus (350 cals,) two packs of hot choco mix, a tad bit of water and blend the liquid on 10 on high until the outside of the pitcher part get very warm to the touch. I then pure it in a glass. It is so easy and he loves it and it gets him out the door in minutes.

Thank you for all the responses. This is my second (and last) baby, so I do know I will be making baby food in whatever machine(s) I buy for a limited time. I want to make sure whatever I buy will have other uses for us and the way we cook.

Since I have agreed to make potatoes au gratin for a family dinner this Sunday, I have decided I must buy a food processor on Saturday, lol. I hate slicing all those potatoes with a knife.

I am still debating the Vitamix, as we very rarely use our current blender. I'm not sure if that would change if we had a great blender rather than a pretty but low powered one. My 3-year-old daughter does love smoothies when we buy them, so I'm sure she would love if we made them and I could sneak in some veggies along with the fruit. I do worry about the high calorie count of smoothies, though, which is part of why we only buy them infrequently.

I have a Blend Tec (like Dilly) and a Cuisinart. Love them both!!

They serve totallydiffwrent functions in my kitchen. Food processor used for pesto, slicing onions, various recipes. Blen Tec is for whole fruit and veggie smoothies.

I'd urge you to check out Blend Tec. Same price point as Vitamix. My mom has a Vitamix and it's fabulous, but I chose Blend Tec b/c it's equally powerful/functional but I think it's sleeker and more streamlined. Gorgeous, actually!

A girl with a blog - I think it's called Green Smoothies Girl-- did a really unbiased head to head. She owns both.

I have both a Blendtec and Vitamix (both the newest model, and somewhere back in storage the old metal model with the spigot.)

They both have their strengths. I find the Blendtec slightly faster making liquid from greens. I like to make non-roasted almond butter from raw, unpasteurized almonds with as little added oil as possible. This is a tough, tough job. (roast them or add enough oil and it becomes easy). Both can usually do it, the Blendtec faster at it, but despite Blendtec's claims that they don't need the pusher like Vitamix has, it's just not true for some tasks and volumes of ingredients, including this one. So you can end up frequently opening the top and scraping down in those types of cases (Blendtec will tell you to use a different volume -- you don't need to worry about this with Vitamix). Vitamix's pusher, which you can use while the machine is running is great. I also find the Vitamix more intuitive to use. I'm not a fan of Blendtec's funky menu-based controls (shades of Miele MasterChef).

In the end though, I'll give the edge to Blendtec because of its smaller size (footprint and height). I like their smaller volume container they sell as well. I'll probably eventually sell the Vitamix.

From your usage description, kaysd, I think you're right that just getting the food processor is the best fit for you.

"I do worry about the high calorie count of smoothies, though, which is part of why we only buy them infrequently."

The major advantage to making your own is you control the ingredients. Start with a non fat greek yogurt, add half a frozen banana and frozen strawberries for a great, low fat, healthy smoothie.

I regret I didn't have my blentec when my girls were eating purees, but now that they are older (school age), I find the smoothies even more important because it ensures they eat wholesome, healthy foods. If you look at the Sneaky Chef or Seinfeld cookbooks, you can get alot of ideas for adding purees to food.

Your Au Gratin sounds divine. If it will peel the spuds, I will go buy the cuisinart food processor today. LOL!

I have a KA fp and an older Vitamix and use both for different tasks. With the newer Vitamix machines you can get a 48oz container for making smoothies, soups, etc. that comes in just under 18" total height.

When you make your own smoothies you can leave out the high calorie junk like sherbert and juice.

I use my stick blender for them. It can do smoothies for 2 kids with no issues. I use frozen fruit from TJ's and some liquid (milk, almond milk, soymilk, or even sparkling water is fun too). I throw in a scoop of protein powder to counteract the carbs and a shot of flax seed oil because its good for you.

just a few other ideas that might save you some space, you can use a mandoline for slicing. for baby food, i found that the food processor or blender were just too big to prepare the smaller batches that we needed. so we got a foodco electric baby food mill which was very inexpensive and is great for small batches and it blends pretty finely (there is also a manual version too). i also like to use it to puree garlic too.

There is a Blendtec demo at Costco this weekend, so I will check it out before making a decision. The height is better, but Blendtec is not available in stainless steel.

We like to make baby food in large batches and freeze in ice cube trays. A stick blender or food mill will not work for the large batches we do. DD is just starting solid foods, and I need to make and freeze a few months' worth of foood before we start our kitchen reno.

I second Michou's suggestion of a mandolin for thinly sliced.potatoes and other veggies. I use mine a lot even though I own a commercial fp. I like having minute control over slice thickness. Plus, its small and cheap!

Side note, I can't believe your baby is already old enough for pureed foods. Time sure does fly!

Breezy, I'll check out mandolines too. I also can't believe DD#2 is 5.5 months old. I was supposed to have our kitchen reno done before she was born, lol. She had her first solid food - rice cereal - this week and loved it. We start making veggie purees this weekend!

I don't think it's overkill. I had a food processor long before I got a Vitamix. Now that I have my Vitamix the food processor gets used a LOT less though. It's become my pesto and sauce maker.

The dry blade container does a decent job at chopping veggies. If I had only one it would definitely be the Vitamix. I am buying a reconditioned one for my sister for Xmas. A good deal at $379.

Here is a link that might be useful: Vitamix Coupon

FYI for anyone reading this comment section after 9/2017:

vitamix 2500 is under counter size

17.25"

I have a KitchenAid Proline 16 cup FP, a Vitamix (which I will give to my daughter) and a Blendtec. We like the Blentec a LOT better than the Vitamin - easier to use, better results, fits under the upper cabinets no problem and about $120 cheaper at Costco.