Life
Cut The Cheese — Not Your Fingers — With These 3 Handheld Graters
When it comes to preparing delicious foods like enchiladas, quiches, or mac 'n cheese, a cheese grater is a must-have kitchen tool that makes food prep a snap. With a small amount of effort, you can use it to create beautiful shards of cheese ready to be eaten or melted within minutes. And, pro-tip: The best hand held cheese graters are usually more affordable and less bulky than their countertop counterparts.
So if you're finally ready to trade out those bags of grocery store pre-shredded cheese for your own grater, there's a few things you should know. When shopping for a hand held cheese grater, you should take into consideration the volume you're expecting the tool to handle. A rasp-style grater is great for shredding cheese directly over food or a pot. But if you plan to shred big batches of cheese for casseroles or pizzas, you might prefer a box-style grater that's easiest for larger volumes. Lastly, for very light dusts of Parmesan on top of pasta (or wisps of chocolate as the finishing touch on desserts,) you may find that a hand held rotary cheese grater is simplest to use for such small and fine grating.
For more details on the best hand held cheese graters you can buy, take a look below.
1Best Rasp Cheese Grater
This hand held rasp-style grater features a simple but effective design, stainless steel blades, and a reinforced frame to ensure the grater doesn't bend when pressure is applied. On the other end of the tool is an easy-to-grip rubber handle that's comfortable to hold while you shred. This tool is perfect for holding over a bowl of pasta or a plate of tacos, as the cheese falls right out the back of the rasp and onto your food. When you're done, you can put this product in the dishwasher without worrying about it rusting. It's dishwasher-safe and even comes with a lifetime warranty!
2Best Box Grater
If grating cheese is something you do often and in large quantities, a box grater, like this OXO Good Grips one, should be on your radar. It comes with a non-slip grip handle and not one but three different sharp stainless steel blade options, from fine to coarse, that are ready to be used on each side of the tool. (It also has a bonus slicing surface on the fourth side for those times when you need to cut larger pieces in addition to shreds.) What makes this product unique from most other box graters is the accompanying container that can be attached to the bottom to catch and keep all of the cut-up cheese neatly contained inside the tool. Plus, the same container can also act as a measuring cup as well as a lidded storage box. So for shredded cheese-lovers, this is an especially useful tool to have around the kitchen, and it's less than $20 to boot.
3Best Rotary Cheese Grater
This rotary-style ZYLISS cheese grater delivers a restaurant-quality grating experience for a fraction of the cost. To use it, you simply load thin strips of cheese into the etched stainless steel drum, and then, gripping the top of the tool with one hand, use the other hand to turn the tool's crank to begin shredding. It's a nearly effortless way to grate small amounts of hard cheeses like parmesan, cheddar, or provolone, as well as to create thin shavings of chocolate and nuts. Best of all, its removable parts can be safely loaded into a dishwasher for easy cleaning.
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