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Reviewed / Lindsay D. Mattison
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If you’re looking for an easy-to-use, compact tool to help you make perfect slices, you should definitely buy a mandoline. These devices are great at thinly slicing vegetables while ensuring they’re exactly the same size. Evenly sliced ingredients not only look great, but they also cook uniformly.
Ideally, a good mandoline slicer should be capable of thinly slicing vegetables with ease, but more importantly, it should be safe to use. We subjected several popular mandoline slicers to a barrage of tests to find out which ones safe, sharp, and easy to use.
Here are six mandoline slicers available in Canada that made the cut.
1. Prepworks by Progressive Adjust-A-Slice Mandoline
The Prepworks by Progressive performed well on all the vegetables, including the rough lemons and super hard sweet potatoes. While it’s the largest and heaviest of the hand-held mandolines, it’s also an attractive little piece. It comes with a julienne blade attachment, which can be switched on with the flip of a dial. The blade size switches with the click of a button and safely locks into place for storage. It's also the least expensive option on this list.
Get the Prepworks by Progressive Adjust-A-Slice Mandoline from Amazon Canada
2. Kyocera Advanced Ceramic Adjustable Mandoline
The Kyocera Adjustable was the smallest and lightest-weight model on this list. It’s also the only one with a ceramic blade, which means it’s not only super, super sharp but it should also last longer than stainless blades without dulling or rusting. The four slicing settings were easily changed by turning the dial on the back, which also allowed you to lock the blade safely into a storage position. The finger guard left something to be desired, but since the blade was so sharp I didn’t have to use too much effort to slice the vegetables. Since it’s so small, you will need to remove your stacked slices more frequently than with a larger model, but that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make for paper-thin slices!
Get the Kyocera Advanced Ceramic Adjustable Mandoline from Amazon Canada
3. OXO Good Grips V-Blade Mandoline Slicer
While we generally felt that the hand-held models performed better, the OXO Good Grips V-Blade was our favourite standing model. It sits at a diagonal angle, so it had the same effortless ergonomic setup as the handhelds to slice in a downward motion. It did struggle a bit with the hard sweet potatoes, but it had our favourite finger guard of the group. The metal tongs solidly pierced the food and the top was retractable, allowing you to slice almost the entire vegetable and creating very little waste. The thickness settings were easily changed by twisting the dial, but the two julienne blades and a crinkle-cut blade were quite a bit harder to change out.
Get the OXO Good Grips V-Blade Mandoline Slicer from Amazon Canada
4. OXO Good Grips Adjustable Handheld Mandoline Slicer
I really liked the small profile and the clip-on finger guard on the OXO Good Grips Handheld Mandoline. It performed really well on the thicker settings—which were controlled by a slide dial that includes a lock setting—but it didn’t make uniform slices on the thinner settings. The rubber feet gripped nicely and the handle was comfortable, but some of the other hand-held models had an edge up when it came to performance.
Get the OXO Good Grips Adjustable Handheld Mandoline Slicer from Amazon Canada
5. Benriner Mandoline Slicer
I've owned this Benriner vegetable slicer for almost five years, carrying it around with me in my knife roll from job to job. So, I was shocked when it underperformed on these tests! I knew that the finger guard was a joke (you may as well throw it out, it’s more dangerous to use it), but I thought this model would have one of the sharper blades. While it is the best for adjusting blade size (a screw allows you to choose any size you like), and it is comfortable to hold, the bridge is susceptible to kickback as you use it. This all adds up to make it significantly more dangerous than the other models.
Get the Benriner Mandoline Slicer from Amazon Canada
6. Swissmar Börner V-Prep Mandoline V-5000
The box-style model of the 7-piece Swissmar Börner is great for storing the slicer and its attachments, but it has a major design flaw. This mandoline doesn’t have a hand-held grip or retractable feet, so the storage box is also used as the mandoline’s base while you slice. That makes it convenient for catching your sliced vegetables, but the design requires you to remove all the attachments from the box before using the mandoline. Then, since the base is also the storage unit, you have to wash the mandoline and the box before putting it back together for storage. It’s not a hard process, but it is cumbersome and more time-consuming than the other table-top models. In addition to the annoyance factor, the design also forces the mandoline to sit flat as opposed to being at a slight angle like the other mandolines. This made it especially difficult to slice hard vegetables like sweet potatoes.
Get the Swissmar Börner V-Prep Mandoline V-5000 from Amazon Canada