As new, first-time parents, both my husband and I were excited to make our own baby food. My gadget-loving husband had trouble patiently waiting for our daughter to start eating solids so that he could play with the Baby Bullet we received as a gift. We liked the idea of being able to control what goes into the food, as well as saving money over buying pre-packaged baby food.

At $59.00 on Amazon, the Baby Bullet seemed steep given that I figured it would just do the same thing my Cuisinart could do. But it has a few significant advantages to a regular-sized food processor and it’s gotten a lot of mileage in our kitchen. Now, not only do we use it almost daily for baby food, but we’ve found it does a great job with “parent” food too!

What makes the Baby Bullet worth it?

1. It’s easier to make small amounts of food. Even making food for the week, baby food serving sizes are small. One sweet potato would make 4-6 servings of baby food, but putting a single sweet potato (or equal amount of other food) in my Cuisinart meant I was having to scrape down the bowl constantly because the entire amount would get spread out. The Baby Bullet comes with a small bowl and medium bowl that screw onto the blade base, both of which puree a smaller amount of food handily.

While this feature (small portions) is pretty much the point of a baby-food specific item, I’ve also made individual batches of pesto, single servings of smoothie, and a small portion of hummus with my Baby Bullet. It’s a great way to use up extra food that would have gone to waste, but wasn’t quite enough to justify pulling out my Ninja blender. (If you’re looking for a full size blender, Bobbi adores her Blentec blender.)

2. The Baby Bullet is easier to clean. The blade is attached to the base, and screws on and off easily for cleaning the bowl and base (and for switching between bowls). This means there are fewer parts to clean and keep track of. Since my kitchen is also full of bottle parts and pump parts I’m trying not to lose, this small feature is a huge relief!

3. It’s user-friendly even when sleep-deprived. Screw on the blade base, put in the food and a little bit of water or breast milk, put on the lid, and push the bowl down into the motorized base. Release it to stop blending. Push it down in spurts to pulse. I don’t have to worry about which part I attach in which order or figuring out how the different lids line up. Again, when I’m using something nearly every day the simplicity is appreciated.

4. It has all the components you need. The Baby Bullet comes with individual portable containers where you can mark the date you made the food, and a silicone freezer tray (in the same shape as the containers) for freezing. The food pops right out and fits perfectly in the containers. These are probably the parts you could most easily live without: I know many parents freeze individual portions in ice cube trays and re-use baby food jars for travel. Also, the date dials are easy to bump when opening the jar and then I’m never sure what date I made the food anyway. But while I probably wouldn’t have spent extra money on these additional features, I do find I use them often and appreciate how they make it easy to go from bowl to freezer to fridge as the week goes on.

The Baby Bullet comes with a milling blade for making homemade baby cereals, too, but I haven’t tried it out yet since my daughter never made it through the one box of rice cereal I bought before moving on to other foods. Also, some users on Amazon reported that they put their Baby Bullet in the dishwasher and the plastic warped. I’ve always hand-washed mine and have had no problems.

How much money is the Baby Bullet saving me?

A container of Gerber baby food costs roughly $0.50 at Target. One sweet potato at my local Sprouts market cost me $0.36 and made about four large servings, for $0.09 per serving! Bananas and broccoli came out to about $0.12/serving. That means I can make baby food for 1/4 -1/5 of the cost of buying it! Using conservative numbers, and figuring on three servings per day, I save about $8 a week on baby food, which means the Baby Bullet, which costs $59, would pay for itself in less than two months. If you buy more expensive baby food, or are able to grow your own food at home, you could do that even faster.

Yes, the Baby Bullet has a high “gimmick” persona. And as a “con,” it almost comes with too many pieces (the spatula, the tray for the containers, and the two-container holder seemed excessive). If you have a Magic Bullet lying around you probably don’t need to add this to your collection. But overall, we’ve found the Baby Bullet to be an easy answer for making baby food at home… and when the kids grow up, we’ll pass along the baby-specific parts and just keep chopping, mixing, and dicing in the kitchen.

Do you have a Baby Bullet? What have you made?