Smoothies and acai bowls have reached cult menu status, as consumers are keen to treat themselves with healthy, quick, and great-tasting innovations. Call it a meal, snack, or dessert. However it’s named, consumers want it.
According to Grand View Research, the global smoothie market size was estimated at 12.46 billion USD in 2023, with an expected CAGR of 9.3 percent from 2024 to 2030.
More and more operators attempt to menu these blended items, however, many run into time, labor, and cost inefficiencies due to mechanical difficulties. The problem is that to blend frozen fruit, acai chunks, and the array of add-ons that diversify menu creativity, think nuts, seeds, and vegetables into a consistent, thick smoothie, it can take multiple blends and up to two to three minutes for each output. To speed up the process, staff may add more liquid to the mix, which only dilutes the flavor, alters the recipe, and nutritional values, and increases food waste due to a larger portion size. All while the customer is waiting in line as the queue piles up.
Waring, which introduced the blender to America in 1937, prides itself on being a solutions specialist. Its new Ellipse Blending System won the 2023 Kitchen Innovation Award from the National Restaurant Association. The Ellipse is powerful enough to blend thick consistencies leading to dramatically reduced wait times, labor issues, and food waste.
“A remarkable amount of engineering went into this product to design a system that solves a huge issue for operators globally. Operators need a solution that will not stand in their way of menu innovation focusing on flavor and nutritional development,” says Peter Roffe, director of product development at Waring. “The problem all operators have is bridging, where the blended materials are physically too thick for a traditional blender design to work through. The ingredients get flung to the side walls and over top, creating an air pocket around the blade, leaving nothing to blend. The blade just spins without doing its job. To fix this, people often remove the lid to break the bridge or use a tamper, which puts extra strain on the motor and can cause powerful electrical spikes at their establishment as they force the heavy ingredients down into the blade. It’s similar to slamming on your car brakes repeatedly. The brake pads won’t last long. The Ellipse blending system was created to solve these issues, and it does! No longer will a piece of equipment stand in the way of creating new food experiences.”
Its dual-motor setup allows the Ellipse to output milkshakes in five seconds, smoothies in 10 seconds, and ultra-thick smoothie bowl in 15 seconds or less, with consistent results, every time. The top-down action is driven by the lithium-ion battery-powered Ellipse drive, which automatically drives a dasher system within the BPA-free, 1-liter jar, forcing the ingredients into the spinning blades. The Ellipse drive uses an infrared system where the drive automatically powers up when the sound enclosure is closed.
The Ellipse blending system delivers incomparable blending abilities, powered by Waring’s 3.5-hp Xtreme® blender base. With the ability to produce 1,000 smoothies on a single charge, it offers four times the output of traditional industry blenders. If it were a supercar, its torque would translate to unparalleled kitchen efficiency and visual appeal.
Roffe puts it simply: “You’ll be able to blend what you want, when you want, as fast as you need it.”
Discover the power and efficiency of the Ellipse Blender at waring.com.
