I was in the same position as you back in October last year
BXMurphy
. I know the feeling. I am a proponent of buying quality equipment since it will last and you're more likely to be satisfied with it at the end of the day. Granted, your question about where do you stop? is a valid one.
I'm more than happy with what I have now, but there are a few things I wish I knew before buying.
I started with the kitchenAid grinder/stuffer attachment. There are a LOT of positive reviews online for it by people that occasionally grind meat. The grinder did 'ok', but the stuffer was not fun to work with at all. After I struggled to get a decent stuff on my cheddar jalapeno sausages I upgraded to a dedicated stuffer. It was night and day, but unfortunately now I needed to grind more meat to keep up. I returned the attachment and started looking for a dedicated grinder.
I looked at a lot of reviews and specs for grinders. It can be confusing. .35hp, .5hp, 1hp, 1.5hp, solid gears, plastic housing, aluminum head vs steel head, commercial vs home use etc.
It is really helpful to have an idea of how much meat do you realistically think you'll be grinding? I know it can be hard to predict now, but it's a starting point. If you're only looking at grinding a few roasts a year for a night of burger grilling and making a few sausages, you don't really need much. In that case the MightyBite #8 would be more than adequate.
If you think that you might like to do more than the occasional grinding, consider stepping up in grinder size.
I have a #5 Weston Butcher Series Commercial meat grinder. It's .35hp. It is heavy and solid. It will grind 3-5lbs of meat a minute. I know that the speed rating probably doesn't make any sense now, but it will after you run a batch or two through a grinder.
For example, I ground up a 3.5kg (7.7lbs) pork shoulder in about 3 minutes. It would have been faster, but I was struggling to keep up with separating the meat chunks (some of it froze together) and feeding the machine. It didn't miss a beat, slow down, hesitate or even get mildly warm. Don't take this as a pitch for Weston as I'm positive a #5 LEM would do the same. It takes me longer to set up the machine, then clean up the hopper, head, auger, plates and blades than it does to grind the meat.
You're looking at the LEM #8. That's .5hp and is rated for grinding up to 7lbs of meat a minute. Essentially then the roast I mentioned above that took me around 3 minutes, would be burger in one minute. You will spend more time cleaning than grinding unless you're doing a LOT of meat in one go. If you go this route, the extra $50 over the #5 is money well spent even if it's more than you need. For now...
Generally, plates are interchangeable when comparing #'s though see the post above you for John's (Fueling Around) experience with a Weston home vs pro grade #8. Generally #8 grinder plates and parts are readily available. #5 is not so much in my neck of the woods. I got two plates with my Weston (a fine 3.5mm and a coarse 7.5mm plate). I did some searching and eventually found a kidney plate and a 10mm coarse grind #5 plate made by none other than LEM.
Also keep in mind that once you grind the meat, you still have to do something with it. So far, I think my biggest grind to date was in the 17lb neighborhood. That was a lot of work. Grinding, stuffing, cleaning, and smoking. Not to mention packaging after all was said and done. I'm at the point now where I've packed everything away since I'm plum out of freezer space.
