Breville Blend-Active Smoothie Maker Review - Debenhams Health Kickstart

There are so many smoothie makers to choose from that it can get a little confusing. A while ago I decided to take the plunge and buy a Nutribullet (after scrimping and saving). But I’m well aware that not everyone has the spare cash to spend £70-£100 on a smoothie maker.

So when Debenhams got in touch and asked if I fancied taking part in their New Year Health Kickstart campaign by trying out an affordable smoothie maker, I figured it would be a great way to hopefully find one I can recommend to you guys.

I was sent a Breville Blend-Active VBL062 and decided I would do two things to try it out. I wanted to try making one of my all-time favourite smoothies in it so see how the smoothie maker coped with the ingredients, and the other thing I wanted to do was taste test one of the recommended recipes in the product manual.

First up, I decided to do the taste test… I chose to make the ‘Berry Blitz’ recipe.

I don’t like almond milk so swapped it for Lactofree milk. And yes, I do realise that the fact I don’t like almond milk makes me an outcast from the health bloggers community. 😉

I’ve tried loads of smoothies over the years – some of which were great, and some of which I would run a mile from if anyone tried to force feed me them now. This recipe was actually very nice!

Admittedly, not the best smoothie I’ve ever tried, but it was refreshing and tasty. And I love the fact it only involved a handful of ingredients, so hardly took any time to make.

The Blend-Active coped with all of the ingredients very well and all that was left was the raspberry seeds, which I did expect as even my Nutribullet doesn’t always get rid of every single raspberry seed. I do prefer my smoothies without bits as I’m one of those people who has a weird thing about certain textures, but considering the price of this machine and the fact everything else blended perfectly I was impressed.

Next up, I decided to put the Blend-Active Blender through the test with my favourite smoothie – my banana choco pb. Click here to get the recipe.

I thought this would be a good one to test out as the thick peanut butter and protein powder can often be more difficult to blend than soft ingredients like fruit. But the machine didn’t struggle with it at all! There was some peanut butter left on the inside of the bottle from when I dropped it in, which also happens with my Nutribullet because peanut butter is a sticky little thing, but it blended perfectly after I stopped the machine and scooped it off the side with a spoon.

The machine handled all of the ingredients brilliantly. There weren’t even any protein powder clumps!

So, here’s my overall review of the Breville Blend-Active Blender VBL062

Ease of use: The blender couldn’t be more simple to operate – you just plug it in, fill up the bottle with ingredients, put the blade lid on, put the bottle in the machine and push the button to whizz it all up. It’s also handy that the blending bottle comes with an actual bottle lid, so you can blend in the same container that you then carry with you. Anything that saves on time and washing up gets my vote!

Blending ability: As I’ve mentioned above, it managed to blend all of the ingredients I put in without any struggle and the drinks I made were deliciously smooth. The raspberry seeds weren’t all completely blended, but considering that even my Nutribullet doesn’t always manage that, I think this is brilliant! Every other ingredient was blended perfectly, and there were no random clumps/lumps/bits in any of the drinks I made using it. Great!

Appearance: It’s a cute bright white and green, which brightens up the kitchen worktop. And because it’s so small it means it will be able to fit in any kitchen. Even if you are running low on worktop space, this could easily be tucked away in a cupboard and just pulled out when you need to use it.

Price: A very affordable £30, which I think is fantastic! Considering I saved up almost £100 to invest in a Nutribullet, and the only difference I’ve found so far is that a Nutribullet tends to handle things like nuts and seeds better, I’d say the Breville Blend-Active is an absolute bargain!

Would I recommend it? Absolutely! You can check it out over at Debenhams now by clicking here.