How to Use a Kitchen Mandoline

A kitchen mandoline is a slicing tool that is used to cut uniform pieces of food to your preferred shape and size. When your ingredients are all the same size, they cook more evenly and look nicer on the plate. For most applications a mandoline is faster than using a kitchen knife and is especially helpful if you have a large amount of vegetable prep work to do. If you are a serious cook consider using a mandoline to up your cooking game.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Mandoline
• Vegetable to slice

1. 
   Select your blade

   Select your attachment blade. Your mandoline comes installed with a standard blade for a potato chip type cut, but has interchangeable blades for other types of cut such as julienne, dice or french fry. If you want to use one of the specialty blades replace the standard blade with the one you want to use.

2. 
   Adjust thickness

   Set your preferred thickness. Use the dial on the side of your mandoline to set how thick or thin you'd like your slices to be.

3. 
   Use your hand guard

   Prepare your hand guard. The hand guard is a separate piece that holds the vegetable in place and shields your hand from the blade. Secure your vegetable in the hand guard piece using the hand guard skewers. If you do not have a hand guard, consider getting a kevlar glove to protect your hand from the blade when using a mandoline.

4. 
   Use the hand guard and slice with a fast downward motion

   Hold the guard and vegetable with your dominant hand, while holding the mandoline down with your other hand. Use a fast downward motion to slice your vegetable against the blade. After a few slices check to make sure the slices are the right thickness. Make sure to use the same pressure against the blade to ensure your slices are the same size.

Tips & Warnings

• Use the standard blade set to the smallest slice setting to make paper thin slices of potato to make homemade potato chips.
• Your mandoline is dishwasher safe except for the blades. Make sure to remove the blades before washing your mandoline in a dishwasher.
• Always use the hand guard! It is very easy to cut yourself using a mandoline.

[starlet67]

on 5/31/2009 Great tips and great use of pics for using a KitchenMandoline!5*