Flash in the Pan

When I read a press release about the Messermeister julienne peeler, I knew I had to give it a try. The concept is delightful for anyone who has spent time cutting vegetables into a julienne. Instead of picking up a knife, you take this device that looks like a vegetable peeler with an odd blade. Pass it over a vegetable, and off come long, thin strips ready for cooking or garnish. I contacted the company, which sent over a test unit - and I've got to say, it works nicely. I used it on a carrot and quickly enough had a pile of orange strings. In fact, the edge of the blade is sharp enough for scraping the outside of the carrot to remove the outer layer instead of dirtying a regular vegetable peeler as well.

My son asked if we could use it to make hash browns, so I have that a try. In this case, I did use the traditional peeler on the skin (had to do the extra cleaning anyway) and then the julienne cutter. I had to break apart the julienne strips because they would get stuck at the very end of the swath I cut. But they separated easily and quickly. Adding some salt and pepper, I dropped a mass into a heated pan with oil and, after a few minutes on each side, had a hash brown cake. You could probably use it on most root vegetables and create new garnishes and ingredients. To avoid accidentally turning your fingers into piles of julienne while trying to grab the cutter from a drawer, there's a clear plastic blade cover - a nice touch. The suggested retail is $8. It won't take the place of a full mandolin with interchangeable blades, but at the same time it's a whole lot cheaper.