Wow. (long and edited post with learned comments and advice as I go, but this product is still worth WOW)*****Another edit ins... Read More
Wow. (long and edited post with learned comments and advice as I go, but this product is still worth WOW)*****Another edit inserted here after 4 months of using this. I make an average of three pots a day, soymilk/okara, and cashew milk. There is some mulm and tarnishing that happens around the impeller blades, impeller shaft and bottom of the central unit, plus the very bottom of the pot. About once a week during cleanup (I clean as I process/pour the milk) I use Barkeeper's Friend on a small square of a scrubbee pad and that will get it shining without an issue, it will look brand new again. Scotch blue scrubbee pads work great to clean, I cut them in 1/8th size pieces and use just a little piece for a few days of cleaning then discard and take a new one. I paid for this pot in the first three weeks I owned it, and it is still going strong. (2-3 batches of milk a day). Soymilk hot is an acquired taste but a cup right at pour is great. Warm cashew milk, just at drinking temperature, is out of this world. Add Ceylon cinnamon and nutmeg to the soymilk to hide the 'bean' flavor, and add nutritive yeast flakes to the cashew milk to give to give it a better flavor and more body. Been so worth it to invest in this pot!(rest of older review and comments and advice below)It is bigger than I thought. Inside is nicely shiny where machine and food meet.I have very hard water so I bought RO filtered water to use with this including cleaning. Trust me, our water leaves rings around everything so this is necessary. It was suggested to use well filtered water or RO water with this machine.Inside was packed is a ziplock with a non scratching scrubber, a very fine small sieve on handle, the bean or ingredient measuring cup, an instruction book, a funny looking D shaped chunk of plastic, and a pitcher. The D shape fits into the pitcher to make a handle. Plus a small bag of Laurabean soybeans (Amazon also sells extra bags of the beans) and the appliance cord. The first 16 pages of the booklet are in Japanese and 17 onwards have English. Pages 19-21 are repeated in French as 22-23. The English and French translations are fair. There is exactly enough soybeans in the little pack to make one pot.Wow this is great stuff... It took about 15 min the first time to set up and 30 to cook up the first batch. It does make noise. The Okara (pulp) left, I get to try making something with it, looking forward to that. Have batch #2 going as I have tofu coagulant and a press standing by, can't wait to make some for supper. After I get used to it, it should take five to set up, and five to ten minutes to clean up afterwards. It does suggest that you wait between batches to let the machine cool down before making another one.I also bought cashews, will be trying a batch of cashew milk later and will update on how that goes. It is easy to clean up, give it a few to cool off first, but don't let stuff dry on. If it dries on there are warnings about how that stuff won't come off. Stuff sticks on the shaft near the blade, so you might need a little scrubbing there! (edit, as soon as I pull the plug, uncord the pot, and pull the lid, I take a wet paper towel and start wiping okara off the grinder part. It being hot the okara dries and sticks on almost immediately. Make sure to get the probe cleaned off too)I estimate that instead of $8.52 a gallon, this is costing me $2.50 with the beans, the RO water and the electricity. Plus a dollar a gallon added for enough gallons to pay for the pot, then it will be like saving $7.00 a gallon. PLUS I get the okara. Nice. To me it's worth the investment. No extra sugar, no extra salt, I know exactly what's in what I'm drinking. If you are living a vegetarian or vegan diet, or for other reasons can't have dairy, this pot is well worth your investment.Do know though that you will have to keep supplies on hand, and have to clean and maintain the pot as you use it. Also the 'milk' won't keep as long as the store purchased stuff. It gives you about 50 oz or 1.5 or a bit more liters, at a batch. (half gallon jug is 64 oz). So depending on your useage, for one, you can probably get away with a batch every second day. I figure I will be doing about two batches a day to also make tofu, tempeh, vegan cheeses. And a batch of cashew milk every other day. (currently doing about 2 batches a day. Get about 6 Anchor Hocking 1 qt mixing bowls, you will use them for soaking beans or sorting out okara (pulp). )Further notes: dry bean batch, use 1.5 of the little measure cups, rinse, put in, add the water, assemble, plug in, turn on. Spouse says it sounds like the disposer is possessed. I didn't think it sounded that bad. Dry bean, it has a beany taste that is a bit hard to kill. Made great tofu. Tried the soaked 8-12 hour beans, much better flavor. Do get at it as you literally unplug and take the lid off to clean the okara off. It turns into yeuk glued on fast. Nice wet paper towel will get it off, work fast. Shaft to the blades does like to cake on the most. (12-16 hours soak in fridge gives a good texture to your milk AND your okara)The sieve in the kit fits on the plastic pot, and will fall in as you pour, you will need one hand to hold it in place. Have your bowl ready to scoop the okara out as it will clog up the sieve quickly. The bottom of the cooking pot will be pretty solidly okara. It's amazing, you will get pretty close to a 1 quart mixing bowl full of okara out of the batch. It is very blah and fiber-y, great for a filler for other things. It will take too much sweetening if you are on restricted carb to eat like a thick porridge. It goes well in fruit smoothies to add fiber, into baked goods to add texture and fiber. 'Savory' or baked goods works a lot better with the leftover (okara). Just plan on what you're going to do with it, do NOT run it down your disposer. The sieve could use to have the pair of little prongs on the rim to keep it in the top of the pitcher.If doing soaked bean, measure your beans dry then rinse then soak, then hull, then add them drained to the pot.... then fill with water other than the rinse/soak water. Pot is a bit quieter also. I soak beans morning and before going to bed, so I can make a morning pot to cook with and have milk in evening, and evening pot to have milk for the morning. (hulling is not going well but they get sorted out into your okara)Edit:The little measuring cup is marked in tenths. For making a batch of soymilk, it recommends 1 1/2 of the little cups full. That is exactly half a bean level over 2/3 cup. I found that adding about 1/3 to 1/2 the little cup full of rice, just rinsed and picked, to the charge of 2/3 cup soaked soybeans when making your batch will give you a thicker texture milk and cut the bean taste some.To the milk and the okara, I add Ceylon cinnamon, about a teaspoon to the okara and half to a teaspoon to the soymilk, and some NUTMEG. This will kill off the bean taste especially in the milk. A little will do it fine. Ceylon cinnamon is milder in flavor than the other types and has less coumarin, which may be hard on your liver when eating supplemental cinnamon to control blood sugar and cholesterol. The nutmeg will help cover the flavor. I further add some stevia and a little (emphasis on LITTLE) brown sugar to bring up the sweet a bit, that the cinnamon will impart to the flavors.(recommended intake of cinnamon for this is 1 to 6 grams a day, at least a gram, which is 0.2 teaspoons. 6 grams would be 1.2 teaspoons, so about 1 1/4 teaspoons a day--add to any higher carb food to assist with the blood sugar ramp up. Always ask your doctor first, and get their approval.)Cashew milk- I used 3/4 cup raw, soaked 3 hours and ran it on soaked bean. Almost no pulp when poured through the fine sieve that comes included. I ran it through muslin as it did produce something. The milk is smooth and thin. I did the wonderfix of putting 1/4 cup rinsed rice in with the cashews to give it more body. It came out very well. I like cashew milk as it seems to tend to decease my hunger as a snack booster. Most of the pulp you do get is stuck to the grinder blade assembly and it wipes off like baby poo. It sticks less than soybean okara. I was able to rinse and wipe it off and the inside of the pot without scrubbing. Overall a success. If you want cashew butter, use your blender after you soak the beans and do it manually for cooking, do not use this pot. It is not meant for that! Read Less