Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I supposed this was a great gadget, based upon the majority positive feedback posted about the gadget. However, in my experience, the product just does not measure up. CON 1. The box came with no instructions inside and had lots of German on the outside. It would have been helpful if I read German, I suppose. PRO 2. I tried it only three times: twice with zucchini and once with carrots. Firm zucchini (make sure center of zucchini is also firm) works great. CON 3. Squishy-centered zucchinis and other veggies do not work with the hand guard. The hand guard will cut through them instead of holding them still enough to continue spiral-cut. Messy clean-up for sure, as you try to fish everything out--squishy or firm--without cutting your fingers on the blades. CON 4. Your veggies have the best use with this gadget if it is the same circumference as the opening itself. With my skinnier veggies, because of the lack of instructions, I was trying to angle it so that I could make full use of all the blades. It seems to work best if you put the veggies straight into the opening, no matter how fat or skinny your veggies. CON 5. Your veggies cannot be fatter than the opening of this gadget. If they indeed are, I suggest you shave it off with a peeler and use the shavings for something else, like raw lasagna or something. CON 6. If your veggies are too thin, on the other hand, they get caught in the funnel and snap apart like my carrots did. CON 7. Carrots, no matter how I angled them, yielded a circular core "column" that was about half inch diameter that goes through the funnel center of the tool to the other side. Thank goodness my young ones like carrot sticks. However, it was a huge waste of food for the zucchinis that were just tossed off the plate, off the high chair, or to the floor. CON 8. Based on my experience, my spiral cut carrot strands never looked like the picture advertised on the box. CON 9. You don't ever use up all the veggies. I wasted cones of veggies when they were not long enough to continue to be spiral-cut and too short to work with the hand guard. CON 10. You pretty much need to keep the veggie steady in your hand as you grip and "sharpen" or else you end up with cuts that are short and these get caught in the spiral cutting grooves. CON 11. Cleaning out squishy stuff from squishy-centered vegetables or the remaining short-strip veggies that get caught in the spiral cutting grooves is a MAJOR hassle. I found I needed to poke with a knife between the stainless steel blades. CON 12. I thought the pencil sharpening motion for the initial spiral cutting of a vegetable (before you absolutely have to use the hand guard) would be a great fun skill for young cooks in the kitchen. Not even fun for me and in fact the blades and the grooves and even the hand guard that you cannot snap in place is plain dangerous for little fingers. Also didn't want to show the kids that I was poking a knife into the grooves to get the short strips out, in case they try the same thing and damage the blades. CON 13. All the cons weighed up against this product so much that the dread of even using it was enough for me to evade it and even forget about asking for a refund in the refund time frame. I guess it was because it was the second spiral cutting tool that failed in a row to meet up to expectations that also kept me from furthering the search for one that really does score. CON 14. Since the full refund option passed me by, I was even thinking of reselling my Spirelli. However, I would rather save the next unfortunate soul from such misfortune. I suppose another person's trash is someone else's treasure. Even so, I have chosen to save the hassle of shipping, the use of fossil fuels to advance the shipping and have decided the least carbon footprint option, which is to simply add one more woeful item to my kitchen clutter collection. Truly, what a waste of space--this gadget does not even pay rent! In short and quite frankly, I am quite disappointed with ordering kitchen gadgets to experiment with from Amazon. I would rather just go to my local home economics store down the block (0.1 mile)--refunds there would be way easier and much more accessible when needing to bring the kids. At least I know I won't have to take the 1.5+ mile commute to the shipping office, pay for my own shipping, or get partial refund at this point.