"A food processor makes so many tasks in the kitchen a breeze compared to their manual counterparts, whether it's blitzing up a quick pie dough, shredding whole blocks of cheese, or whipping up ricotta cheese with herbs for a smooth and creamy dip. For making spice blends, however, a food processor just isn't the right tool for the job. Instead, one of our favorite unexpected ways to use a coffee grinder is to blitz up whole spices for a custom, fragrant spice blend."
"A food processor isn't the best choice for grinding spices, as the large blade and bowl means that the spices will end up being ground unevenly, even in a mini food processor. The very small bowl and blade of a coffee grinder are perfect for pulverizing small, dense things. Most whole spices are likely and less dense than a roasted coffee bean, which means a coffee grinder can blitz them up into a powder with ease."
"For holiday baking, grind up whole cinnamon sticks, allspice berries, and cloves, followed by a bit of powdered ginger and freshly grated nutmeg. For homemade Chinese five spice seasoning, throw whole Sichuan peppercorns, fennel seeds, cinnamon sticks, star anise pods, and cloves into a coffee grinder and blitz to a fine powder, followed by a quick pass through a fine mesh strainer to catch any larger chunks."
A coffee grinder is ideal for grinding whole spices into fine powders because its small bowl and blade pulverize small, dense items evenly. Food processors produce uneven grind due to large blades and bowls, even in mini versions. Whole spices should be lightly toasted to intensify flavor, then cooled before grinding. Spice blends can be customized extensively: examples include holiday blends from cinnamon sticks, allspice berries, cloves, powdered ginger, and nutmeg, or Chinese five-spice made from Sichuan peppercorns, fennel seeds, cinnamon, star anise, and cloves, sieved through a fine mesh to remove larger pieces.
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