Bull Choppers

Does anyone still use these anymore?  Hobart still makes them, but I have never seen one in a restaurant since the 70's. I got to thinking about using these and the Hobart rotary disc/grid processors with the hand press after some correspondence with Chewy. I totally forgot about the Bull Choppers (we just called it the "Hobart") until I got into a conversation with a friend of my dad's who owned a seafood restaurant. I did prep with these and rotary slicer for years and have some fond and not so fond memories of using these. I see the Robot Coupe and center shaft bowl type processors have taken over the prep arena. I can't imagine how any of these can compare to a non-macerating chop like the old hobarts. They're still around and there are several vids on Youtube showing them like historic relics and they still seem to command a hefty price on E-bay.

Dawn,  did you mean buffalo chopper ?  Still in use.....

Yes, they are also referred to as bull or bowl choppers from what I gather. Who's using them? I'm talking about the countertop units that also had the hub to do other things like meat grinding.

OMG....
i had no idea what that was.... and after seeing the price tag i know why !! lol
 
how does that work ? i cant figure out how it worked ....
 
youtube is awesome....... that is the coolest thing i have ever seen in a kitchen !

I've always used the term bowl cutter.  The smaller table top ones are quite handy to have in a large commercial kitchen.  There are a lot of nice small ones available from China, but I'm sure these are not imported to the states, as they have all chinese on the controls.  The best ones today have both variable speed cutter and bowl, I don't believe the older ones had that capability, but not sure.  We have a medium size floor model to emulsify meats for sausages.  Indispensable for this type of work, they don't overheat the meat blend like a common blade food processor would.  The down side is cleanup, especially for smaller type quantities.  Unless you find one at almost give away price I would not recommend for much else other than emulsifying meats, takes up a lot of space and way too difficult to clean compared to a food processor or mandolin, in the case of chopping veg.

I've seen the chinese companies offering some little ones on the trade sites too. That's one I'm hoping to see make it into the states. Best way to visualize the way they work is to imagine a typical cuisianart blade on a shaft on a right angle to a bundt cake pan that's also rotating and you have the idea. If you prep a lot a veggies, the cleanup isn't bad at all with a wipe down between batches. You really don't have little nooks and crannies, so the entire bowl, cover, comb, and blade are realtively easy to clean and quat. The variable speed I have to give some thought to. The rotation passes are what we used for the metric. I never did any meat with these, just a lot of veggies. These made the most perfect cole slaw. I never gave any thought to the meat being heated and sort of reminds me about why the purists claim a rotary slicer ruins the taste of thinly sliced meats by the heating effect of the blade. I think this logic made a fortune for Berkel and restorers of hand driven meat slicers. One thing that it does very well is the veggies aren't sopping in a lot of juice when chopped like you would get with a cuisinart. You can throw in parsely and scoop out a perfectly chopped handfull that looks like you chopped on a board rather then the wet mush you get with a cuisinart type. The ones I used were big and had a large foot print for about a 15" bowl. They also had a hub on the motor that let you use many different attachments from a french fry maker to a full pan meat grinder.

Man, this thread is bringing back some memories. I remember the machine I used was a Hobart & we just called it "the slaw machine" because that's all we did with it....was 14-15 yrs. old at the time, so don't remember if it had other functions. Certainly didn't take long to make a 5 gal. bucket of slaw!
 
I do know a guy that uses one in his BBQ business and it is a fast and effective way to break up butts. I don't like mine chopped up that fine though.

We don't have any use for ours other than meats, as its located in an area where we would not introduce fresh produce for use due to potential cross contamination.  But with the new ones on high you can blast thru a ton of cabbage for slaw in seconds, and you have to be careful how you control, as the times can be so short its hard to get a coarse cut.  You can turn your slaw into puree in a flash!  The heat problem when doing emulsified meats is a result of the fats melting if the temperature gets too high, this is why most processors use ice instead of just water during processing also.  

How about the rotary disc slicers with the grid? Sort of a cross between the conventional food processor and a ronco vegematic. Haven't seen those around for a while either. I have seen several versions of industrial strength vegematic type presses primarly by Nemco customized for different tasks, but nothing like those continuous feed Hobart units. I can't see why any of the consumer companies incorporate a similar unit as an accessory for their food processor bases. Even the vegematic and similar type grid choppers that are sold for home use have grids that are absolutely impractical for normal sized vegetables.
 
Rod, the relative slowness of the bowl choppers was the great thing. The rotation revolutions were the spec of the chop. I'm wondering why the asian units are incorporating the bowl speed control unless they see these units more for the use of processing meat into pulp.
 
Anyone recall any other pieces of restaurant equipment that's vanished from the kitchen or is now exculsively used for processing? 

DawnT


How about the rotary disc slicers with the grid? Sort of a cross between the conventional food processor and a ronco vegematic. 

 
 
Perhaps today you could choose a robo coupe, they have a lot of options, and have dicing screens or grids, a pricy piece of equipment also, but last forever.
 

DawnT
 
Rod, the relative slowness of the bowl choppers was the great thing. The rotation revolutions were the spec of the chop. I'm wondering why the asian units are incorporating the bowl speed control unless they see these units more for the use of processing meat into pulp.
 

It's better process control, with meat you want to get it in and out quick to reduce heating, so a faster bowl speed combined with very high blade speed will insure a smooth homogenous blend in a short time.  Some units even have bowl revolution counters you set, this insure repeatability with each batch.  Not a real expert but I think a lot of the features were incorporated more for meat processing.  Also in Asia there are a lot of emulsified fish and seafood products that use bowl cutters.