Published May 1, 2004.
Do you really need a special grater for Parmesan cheese?
The server at your local Italian restaurant uses a rotary grater to rain Parmesan over pasta at the table, but does this grater have a place at home? To find out, we tested eight models, grating Parmesan, cheddar, mozzarella, and even chocolate and including a variety of test cooks with different hand sizes and strengths.
Most of the handles were tiny and slippery, and even the most comfortable of the lot became painful after extended use. All but two struggled with mozzarella and cheddar; these two were more successful because of their larger grating drums, which kept the cheese from sticking.
We concluded that a rotary grater is much too slow for use in the kitchen. None of the grater hoppers could accommodate more than one or two ounces of cheese at a time, and each grater gave us hand fatigue after just a few moments of use. Get out a box or rasp grater if you need grated cheese for a recipe.
All of this said, a rotary grater is nice for the table, in part because there's no risk of raking your knuckles across the grater plate--a common occurrence with a box or rasp grater. Be careful, though, when it's time to clean up. Many rotary graters take some finesse to disassemble, as you must touch the sharp grater drum to release the handle for cleaning.
