Dough button on Cuisinarts
I have the 11-cup Cuisinart with the dough button. To be honest, the only thing I think this machine does well is to knead dough and it's basically why I did not return it. When you knead dough with this button active, if you listen carefully, you can hear the motor changing speed slightly to keep the dough consistency right. If you've used other food processors, you'll realize that machines that keep the speed constant will mix the dough and knead it differently -- it's hard to explain, but with the Cuisinart it just mixes and then, when it turns into a ball it goes smoothly around and around.
The downside is that I compare it to my old food processor (a Braun Multipratic) -- what a difference! The Braun would do everything better than the Cuisinart, except knead dough. It's over 10 years old, so the plastic parts are giving up.
One of the things I like in the Braun is that the motor is to the side, so it doesn't heat the contents being processed *and* it has a more logical interlock that lets you have a *real* feed tube that you can use to process large pieces of food -- with the Cuisinart I have to cut everything so it fits the feed tube because of the stupid interlock so the motor is in the "pretty" position under the bowl. The space is saves is not worth it, given that I could process things better and faster with the Braun: take plunger out, insert food, turn it on and apply plunger when food is entirely in the feed tube, with the Cuisinart (and similar designs) you have to process the food by hand by cutting the items into neat 4-inch-tall pieces so they'll fit into the feed tube and let the machine turn on.
Another thing I hate about the Cuisinart is that it takes so much storage space because it needs about 12 discs or so to do less than my Braun could -- each disc can only do one thing, which is to slice or shred one thickness. My Braun had a carrier disc with a space for inserts -- with just a few small inserts you can do an awful lot because the carrier disc lets you adjust the thickness of the cut, so you only need one insert to do the job of many: for example, one insert can cut from 0.5 to 7 (or was it 9?) mm slices, another one can cut potatoes for very thin shoe-string fries to very thick fries etc. Another thing I liked better about the Braun is that the motor had multiple speeds, which I used all the time to obtain different sizes/textures for the food being processed. And it had a mini-bowl for when you were processing small amounts like parsley.
The thing I can see that the Cuisinart seems better is that it looks and feels sturdier. The nice practical plastic carrier disc and inserts in the Braun were precisely what broke over the years. Wouldn't you know it, the parts were very expensive years ago, so I didn't deal at that time -- now they are just impossible to find, after someone (Gillette, I think?) bought Braun in US.
Oh well. Another lesson learned. And really, I think that sometimes form must follow function: the food processors with the bowl on top of the motor with the stupid interlock running all the way from the motor to the feed tube really are a pain in the neck, they make you do a lot of the work. Processors with the motor beside the bowl tend to be easier to use, in my opinion.
