Results Are In: The Best Spiralizer for Zoodles is…

The zoodle olympics just ended and the results for the best spiralizer is in

If you’ve been following along on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, then you know I’ve been getting cray-cray finding the best spiralizer to make zoodles. (And if haven’t, now you know!)

But seriously, what’s it take to get a round zoodle around here? As it turns out, a lot, and it might actually be a myth told from low carb generation to low carb generation, cause round zucchini noodles don’t exist!

That’s OK though, because this weekend I tried out five different zoodlers in search of the best spiralizer out there. I chose the most highly rated ones I could find on Amazon.

I wanted to do this because a couple months ago, I found a place that actually served Zoodles instead of noodles, called Chef’s Bistro, up in North Conway, NH. They did such a bang-up job, that I was determined to find a better zoodler for home. Theirs weren’t round, but they were sturdy and thick and held up to a delicious lemon cream sauce they served with it.

And so, the search was on. In the zoodle olympics, who would be the best zoodle maker? I tested out these five devices:

• Yellow: Kuhn Rikon Julienne Peeler with Blade Protector (4.5 stars / $16)
• Red: The Original Zoodle Slicer (4.5 stars / $15)
• Dark Green: Spiralizer® Tri-Blade Vegetable Spiral Slicer (4.5 stars / $30)
• Orange: Brieftons Tri-Blade Spiralizer (4.5 stars / $30)
• Lime Green: GEFU Spiralfix Spiral Cutter (4 stars / $50)

After zoodling my pants off, I asked my social media pals to tell me which zoodles they liked best.

At the time of this posting, #2 (orange) was by far the most popular vote, which was actually my least favorite device, the Brieftons Tri-Blade Spiralizer. That’s OK though, to each his own! But once you read the review and look back, you might notice that they’re a bit more transparent than the rest. Although you’ll also find out that’s not the only reason why it’s my least favorite.

The results are in: The best spiralizer is…

Want to see how they fared when I put them all to the test, with zucchinis (also known as courgettes, btw) all the same size? Well, let’s get into it!

Kuhn Rikon Julienne Peeler with Blade Protector
(4.5 stars / $16)

This is the very first zoodler I ever owned, and at first, it made very thin strips of zoodles from my zucchinis. After less than a month of use, though, it would still make the strips, but not deeply enough to separate on their own. So you have to break all the tiny noodles it carves out, by hand. This is still the case, as you’ll see from the photos.

• Effort: Moderate
• Packaging: Simple, just the peeler.
• Cleaning: Somewhat annoying, but you can throw it in the dishwasher if you don’t have a pipe cleaner to brush the zucchini out of it.
• Parts: Simple, just the peeler.
• Storage: Simple, just throw it in your utensil drawer.

Bottom Line on the Zoodles: These Zoodles are extremely thin and flat. The only perk here is that you can shave only down to the seeds. Once you get to those, your zoodles can get watery, so it’s nice to have the choice of only using the best parts of the zucchini. This leads to pastas that are less watery, and that’s awesome. This is the ONLY device on this list (and that I know of) that gives you the freedom to do this, but the Spiralizer and Brieftons both core out the middle, although not enough for my liking.

The Original Zoodle Slicer (4.5 stars / $15) (similar to Vegetti)

• Effort: Low
• Packaging: Simple, just the peeler.
• Cleaning: Again, you’ll need a pipe cleaner for this one, but I tend to throw this in the dishwasher too.
• Parts: This one comes with the peeler and a little cleaning tool, which I lost almost immediately.
• Storage: Simple, fits in my utensil drawer too.

Bottom Line on the Zoodles: The Zoodles are nice and thick, but their consistency depends on you, since you’re the one putting in all the elbow grease to zoodle. I’ve always been a fan of this zoodler, but I was looking for ones that were a little thicker and more uniform.

Spiralizer® Tri-Blade Vegetable Spiral Slicer

• Effort: Low, worked like a dream.
• Packaging: The entire thing comes out of the box in one piece, no doodads flinging all over the place or anything, it’s already assembled.
• Cleaning: I found this one to be pretty easy to clean, although they’re all kind of tricky because you’re cleaning tiny little blades and trying not to end up with stitches.
• Parts: This one comes with three blades, two for spiralizing and one for thin flat cuts.
• Storage: You’ll need a shelf for it, but it’s nice that there aren’t any pieces you have to keep track of, they’re all stored in the machine itself.

Bottom Line on the Zoodles: I liked the zoodles from this machine best. They’re thick like the hand-held “Official Zoodler” and most resembled the ones I had at that restaurant I mentioned. The machine also was pretty effortless to use and had suction cups on the feet so that it wouldn’t slip all over the place. You could be up and zoodling in less than a minute, from opening package to zoodling. Another pro for this one, is that it cores the middle of the zucchini. I’d prefer it did a little more, because the core is what makes for soggy zoodles, but at least it spits some of it out.

Brieftons Tri-Blade Spiralizer (4.5 stars / $30)

• Effort: Moderate (the thing kept jangling all over the place, super clunky and hard to use, I think because the handle is so huge.)
• Packaging: Even though this device is identical to the Spiralizer® except for color and a larger handle, it didn’t come assembled, so I had to put the handle and wheel on myself. Luckily, that takes all of about thirty seconds, but I did pull the device out, and all the pieces fell over the floor, so I suddenly decided that “packaging” should be a part of these reviews.
• Cleaning: This one was harder to clean than the Spiralizer® even though they’re nearly identical. I couldn’t seem to get the darn zucchini out.
• Parts: After assembling, it has three blades, two for spiralizing and one for thin flat cuts.
• Storage: Again, you’ll need a shelf, and the blades are stored inside the machine, although they didn’t slide as easily into the side as the Spiralizer®, and they kept getting jammed when I tried.

Bottom Line on the Zoodles: Maybe it’s because this thing was jumping all over the counter while I tried to use it, but the small noodles that came from this one were totally thin and transparent. The thicker ones were OK but still not very consistent, again, because I had to wrangle the thing to get it to work. One plus is that like the Spiralizer®, it spits out the core.

GEFU Spiralfix Spiral Cutter (4.5 stars / $50)

• Effort: Low (suuuuper smooth and easy to use)
• Packaging: It’s a smaller device, so it’s a smaller box, but it does come with some parts that you’ll need to assemble (the handle and spinner).
• Cleaning: This one was easiest to clean, yay!
• Parts: Once you assemble the handle to the top with the spinner, it’ll stay in one piece after that.
• Storage: This one requires a little less space, but not much.

Bottom Line on the Zoodles: This one is super easy to use, I mean, seriously no elbow grease at all, it worked like a dream. Another plus is that it cuts four different sizes and all you have to do is switch a knob. The negative is that all of the Zoodles are pretty thin, which is the reason why I didn’t choose this one first. However, this one is definitely the easiest to use, with consistent cuts, and could be used for some fun root veggie salads.

So there you have it. The best spiralizer (to me) was the Spiralizer® Tri-Blade Vegetable Spiral Slicer best, but if you’re on a budget, the The Original Zoodle Slicer is almost as good. And although I really liked how pleasant the GEFU was, the zoodles weren’t thick enough.

One thing I liked about all of them is that they don’t have pieces wandering everywhere getting lost. If the blades aren’t permanently attached, they’re at least stored inside the device. One of my main reasons for not owning a food processor is that I’ve owned two of them, both of which I used less than once because I couldn’t figure the things out, or ended up losing all the pieces. Happy to say that’s not an issue with these spiralizers!

In the same order, something else you might want to see, is how much zucchini gets left behind. The last one, the GEFU Spiralfix Spiral Cutter, barely leaves a smidge left, whereas I can take as much as I want or as little as I want from the first one, the Kuhn Rikon Julienne Peeler with Blade Protector. But the The Original Zoodle Slicer, the second one, leaves a pencil top because you’d cut your damn fingers off if you tried to zoodle the whole thing. The other two leave the core (or part of it anyway).

Oh, and would you like to know what I did with all of these zoodles? Check out three new recipes!

• Cheesy, Buttery, Garlicky Zucchini Aglio e Olio 

• Strawberry Balsamic Zoodle Salad

• Bacon Bleu Zoodle Salad 

So now it’s your turn – do you have any of these zoodlers? Love ’em? Hate ’em?

Have a different one that you love, or.. don’t love so much? Comment and let me know!