I May Never Use a Microplane to Grate Parmesan Cheese Again

There’s nothing quite like grating fresh Parmesan cheese (or any hard cheese really!) over a plate of pasta, a flatbread pizza, or a bed of salad greens. And when that cheese is super, super fresh — as in it was just grated right then and there — it tastes way better than store-bought varieties of shredded hard cheese. 

Plus, grating your own Parmesan cheese is a whole lot cheaper, too. You can buy a block of fresh cheese and then grate it at home for whatever recipe you need, instead of buying those over-priced pre-packaged mixes that often get moldy before you have a chance to use the entire package.

The downside of grating your own Parmesan cheese, of course, is that it can be a little time-consuming and messy in the kitchen. Microplanes are also notoriously super annoying to clean, too — all those tiny holes! But there is a solution: You can grate fresh Parmesan cheese in a blender, such as a high-powered one like the Vitamix! We recently saw this tip over on Bon Appétit, and we remembered it from an older story on Blender Babes.

Here’s how to do it at home: You’ll first cut the Parmesan cheese into one to two-inch pieces and place them in the blender. Then you’ll use the speed button to set it to a desired level based on the model — you’ll have to play around with this a bit depending on your specific blender model. Blender Babes recommends that if you’re using a Vitamix that you use the five or six speed and blend for 15-30 seconds. But again, this really depends on how finely you want your Parmesan cheese to be grated.

A blender is much easier to clean than a Microplane, and you can grate Parmesan cheese in bulk a lot faster. You can have amazing, fresh Parmesan cheese whenever you want – for pasta, salads, or for just putting into your mouth if that’s what you desire! Easy. Breezy.