Handy Dandy Gadget Blog #2- Mini Coffee Grinder

Yep.  I said coffee grinder. And it's all Carolyn's fault.

My friend Carolyn, of Fabulous Fitness fame, read me whining one day about having to buy ground flaxseeds in such large quantity that I feared they were losing their nutrients before I could use them. See, flaxseeds are wonderful little nutritional powerhouses, but you can't get absorb their nutrients in the whole form.  They have to be ground.  Here's where the problem comes in:  They start to lose their nutrients fairly quickly (within a week or two after grinding). A bag of ground flaxseeds lasts a VERY long time when you are only using a tablespoon most days.

So I whined about it, and Carolyn told me to get one of those mini coffee grinders to grind them as I use them. She said it cost about ten dollars at WalMart.  Go get one, already, and stop your whining!  (Okay, she didn't say it JUST like that, but it makes for a more interesting story.)

Anyhow, I went to WalMart and got one, and Carolyn was wrong:  It wasn't ten dollars- It was thirteen.  (Carolyn- you own me three bucks.)

Anyway, I took it home, read the directions (yes, I am one of THOSE people), dropped some whole flaxseed into it that I purchased in the bulk section at United Market Street for about sixty-eight cents (I wasn't going to buy a whole bag just to find out it didn't work), pressed the little button and..... viola!  Ground flaxseed, nutrients intact.  That was pretty cool!  (Can you tell I am easily amused?)

The only caveat is that once you start grinding flaxseeds with the coffee grinder, you do NOT want to grind coffee with it.  Or so I've heard.  The microscopic bits of flaxseed kinda cling to the inside of the grinder.  It's very hard to clean completely.  I'm going to make a guess that flax coffee is probably not so tasty.

So me and my little coffee grinder lived in harmony with the flaxseeds.  Then one day I started hearing about oat flour.  And then I found a recipe I wanted to try with oat flour in it.  (Chocolate PB Protein Brownies by Julie Lohre) I didn't want to buy an entire container of oat flour for a recipe that calls for just a cup.  So I started thinking.... and Googling  (what DID we do before Google?)........

Upon investigation, I found out that oat flour is simply finely ground oatmeal.  The recommendation was to grind it in a blender.  This sounded dusty to me.  I hate dust.  And then my eye fell on my little coffee grinder.  I thought "I wonder?", and dropped some oats in there.  A whirl or two later, and I found myself staring in amazement at oat flour!  And, to make matters better, when I poured the oat flour out of the grinder, the thing was clean as a whistle.  Double benefit.  Yay!

The brownie recipe was good, by the way, but, of course, I altered it to my own taste. Here's a link to my version.

And there you have it- More information than you ever wanted about mini coffee grinders.  But if you are a flaxseed eater, I'd highly recommend one.  Cheap, easy, and takes up almost no space.  How much better does a gadget get?

For Gadget Blog #1, click HERE.