Is 'Garlic Master' worth your money?

HOUSTON – Garlic adds flavor to any dish, but peeling, slicing and chopping fresh cloves is tedious work.

Consumer expert Amy Davis is testing the Garlic Master, which claims, "Anyone can cut garlic cloves in a split second."

Davis bought the gadget for $10.49 at Kroger.

Davis' mother-in-law, Sharon Eisenbaum, tried it out. She admits she doesn't usually use fresh garlic when she cooks because it's a pain to peel and chop.

"Honestly, my go-to is minced garlic in a jar just like this," she said, pointing to a jar on the counter.

Maybe the Garlic Master will make chopping the garlic so easy she will change her ways.

Sharon rolled the garlic in the silicone peeler that comes with the product. It came out clean.

"Oh, look! That was pretty good," she said.

However, when she dropped a clove into the Garlic Master to twist, she kept losing pieces.

First, the top fell off and then the bottom. It took several tries, but she finally got the hang of it.

"I think you have to use quite a bit of muscle power to get this going," she said, as she twisted the device.

Three cloves of garlic yielded about a tablespoon when it was all done. It was a lot of effort and too many plastic parts in Sharon's opinion.

"For me, I don't like all the little pieces and I could do it with a knife," she said.

The final straw was cleaning the Garlic Master. The last remaining bits of garlic don't easily rinse out of the honeycomb-like blades.

"There's all of this stuck in here," Sharon showed Davis the garlic she couldn't get out. "For me, that's not clean to use again."

And for that, Sharon gives the Garlic Master a thumbs down. 


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Passionate consumer advocate, mom of 3, addicted to coffee, hairspray and pastries.