Food
Fact-checked

At DelightedCooking, we're committed to delivering accurate, trustworthy information. Our expert-authored content is rigorously fact-checked and sourced from credible authorities. Discover how we uphold the highest standards in providing you with reliable knowledge.

Learn more...

What is a Pastry Blender?

Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

A pastry blender, also called a pastry cutter, is a useful tool in the kitchen. Many recipes for pastry crust and for butter or shortening rich biscuits or scones require you to add cold butter or shortening to flour. While you can accomplish this process with two knives or a fork, using the pastry blender makes it easier to adequately cut the butter into the flour.

This helpful kitchen tool is undoubtedly inexpensive, usually about $5-10 US Dollars (USD) or slightly more if you want a very fancy one. It has several u-shaped wires that connect to a straight handle. A few types of the pastry blender have a slight protrusion from one side of the handle that gives you a place to rest your thumb. It’s well worth looking for a type with this extra thumb rest, since you can better control the pastry blender if you can use your thumb to exert pressure on the flour/shortening mix.

Pastries.
Pastries.

The u-shaped wires of the pastry blender do a nice job cutting the ingredients together, and unlike working with your hands to combine the two, the pastry cutter stays cool so you’ll keep the shortening at optimum temperature. Bakers develop various techniques for using them; perhaps at first cutting the butter into smaller amounts between the wires, then rocking the blender back and forth to create an incorporated mix. For standard piecrust, your work is finished with the pastry blender when the butter/flour mix resembles coarse cornmeal. If you’re adding liquid to the pastry, some people continue to use the pastry blender, or they switch to hand combining at this point so just enough liquid is added to make the pastry adhere but not be too sticky.

Mashed potatoes made with a pastry blender.
Mashed potatoes made with a pastry blender.

Even though the pastry blender is specifically meant for making piecrusts and the like, you can use it for a few other things. It makes a perfect masher for a potato or two if you’d like to make some quick mashed potatoes. You can also make delicious guacamole with a pastry cutter. The wires aren’t terribly strong, so you wouldn’t want to use it to mash anything exceptionally hard, but it will work well to crush a few bananas for banana bread, or turn your butternut squash into a lovely puree.

Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

Tricia has a Literature degree from Sonoma State University and has been a frequent DelightedCooking contributor for many years. She is especially passionate about reading and writing, although her other interests include medicine, art, film, history, politics, ethics, and religion. Tricia lives in Northern California and is currently working on her first novel.

Learn more...
Tricia Christensen
Tricia Christensen

Tricia has a Literature degree from Sonoma State University and has been a frequent DelightedCooking contributor for many years. She is especially passionate about reading and writing, although her other interests include medicine, art, film, history, politics, ethics, and religion. Tricia lives in Northern California and is currently working on her first novel.

Learn more...

Discussion Comments

ddljohn

@SarahGen-- I think that both types work well, but the type with blades is a little bit easier to clean. The wires are very close together, which makes it more difficult to wash the blender when you're done. I can't say that the blades are super easy to clean, but it is relatively easier in comparison to the wires. They're both equally effective at blending however.

Aside from mashing potatoes, you can use the sharp end of a pastry blender to make indentations on breads and other baked goods. Unfortunately, a pastry blender is not a very multi-purpose tool. That's about all you can do with it. But it's cheap, so if you have room in your kitchen drawer and if you bake often, it's worth having on hand.

SarahGen

Since I bake more frequently now, I want to get a pastry blender to make my life a little easier. I've noticed that there are two types -- one with wires and one with blades. Which type is better?

And aside from mashing things, is it useful for anything else?

ZipLine

I'm not sure why pastry blenders are sometimes called "pastry cutters". A pastry cutter sounds like a cookie cutter but that's not what it is. It's a blender, it blends ingredients like pastry flour and butter.

Post your comments
Login:
Forgot password?
Register:
    • Pastries.
      By: Gordana Sermek
      Pastries.
    • Mashed potatoes made with a pastry blender.
      By: Joe Gough
      Mashed potatoes made with a pastry blender.
    • Guacamole can be made using a pastry blender.
      By: Brad Pict
      Guacamole can be made using a pastry blender.