Fruits

• Fruit is added to a blender for smoothies, cold soups and sauces. These fruits include any berries, diced apples, pears, oranges, bananas, mangoes or papaya, tomatoes, grapes, and many more. Usually chopped ice and milk or cream is added to the fruit mixture to make smoothies. Cold fruit soups can be created by combining fruit in a blender, as can fruit sauces for chocolate or ice cream desserts, crepes, angel food cakes, and pastries. You can also make your own fruit-based baby food.

Vegetables

• It is important to chop or dice vegetables before using them in a blender, since vegetables are more dense and coarse. For soups or baby food, puree vegetables such as potatoes, beets, carrots, squash, cucumbers, zucchini, mushrooms, brussels sprouts, corn, spinach, peas, beans, broccoli and sweet potatoes, adding liquid as needed. Cook the vegetables until soft before blending. For soups, you may need to reheat on low in a saucepan. You can even create dishes like creamed potatoes in a blender.

Herbs and Dairy

• Herbs and dairy items work in blenders as well. You can grind or shred cheese by adding diced cheese to the blender and running on high for about 30 seconds. Use herbs to make homemade pesto by combining olive oil, cheese, basil, garlic and pine nuts. Add other ingredients to tailor the pesto to your liking. You can also create hummus and cream sauces. A variety of herb sauces can be made by blending together olive oil and herbs.

Breadcrumbs

• Create breadcrumbs in your blender by adding crumbled, dried bread and processing until the crumbs are the desired size. Breadcrumbs can be used for crusting meats, sprinkling on casseroles or vegetable side dishes and breading seafood.