This is interesting. I never do that.
I have two. One is a small ceramic one I use for spices. The other is a large metal one with a wooden pestle that was a gift from my Thai sister-in-law. That gets used for things like making peanut sauce.
Good to know!
The entire town of Tucson is taken over for several consecutive weeks each winter with over 2 dozen recognized shows. Plus people are set up on street corners, hotel rooms, every where. Mine owners from all over the world exhibit and you see things that are museum quality. I’ve worked one of the wholesale shows and I’ve attended as a buyer. The scale and quality is just impossible to convey.
Great food too!
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I have a mediumish sized green marble one like the one in your picture. Works great, easy to clean, doesn’t retain odors. We love it.
I also have one of those wooden Puerto Rican ones that is kind of tall and deep, like a drinking cup ( i.e., a pilon), that I got as a present. It’s very pretty but I hardly ever use it unless I’m making some kind of garlicy paste, since it definitely retains odors - garlic, for example. 
Which is a good thing sometimes.
I do the same thing with my small ceramic mortar and pestle! I use this plastic lid trick with my manual coffee grinder, with the whisk attachment for my immersion blender (I have a perfect sized mixing container so it works properly), and also with a drill attachment I have to mix tahini and natural peanut butter.
Anyway, I have the 8" granite from ImportFood. Love it. Sometimes I wish I had the wooden styles, like those used in Laos and Pakistan, for making Papaya Salad, but I don’t have any more room for large kitchen items.
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I have a 8” granite one for pounding garlic, lemongrass, guacamole, etc.
I have a small brass one thats slim and tall, that I bought in India to crush small quantities of dry spices. Like a couple cardamom and cloves, a bit of fennel seed, etc. If I need more than that, I have an electric coffee grinder that I use just for grinding spices.
Does the Milk Street source describe how to tell the difference between a stone molca and a fake one? The first one I bought turned out to be made of poured concrete (or cement, it didn’t have a lot of aggregate in it). Yikes, gross, not a product you want pulverized in your food. In the end I freaked and just paid money to WS for a certified product. It’s true, the pestle is so heavy, it works fast on just about anything (although I still use my spice grinder for pepper corns because I’m lazy).
I own the same one. It’s a good size and I love it, but yes, heavy.
Thanks for all opinions. I will go to the Thai shop here, and try to see if they carry a medium size marble one. Lots of problem of “sizes” or broken pieces with online purchases. Maybe eventually another molcajete, as it is really different and I would like to do some S. American cooking as well.
Ditto.
Bought this molcajete on Amazon FR, the parcel arrived with the pestle wrapped in a Mexican newspaper. Need your advice, is it in lava rock or concrete? Thanks in advance!
I got stuck w/a concrete fake once & bought a replacement through WS, assuming they have some quality control. Yours looks like my WS model: the pattern of voids looks correct . When I seasoned the WS one, the rock ground down w/tiny chunks at first. The concrete one made concrete-smelling dust. The rock of the WS model has tiny inclusions (flecks) of something that glistens, like mica. Did not see such in the concrete one.
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Thanks Jammie for the confirmation. I grinded a bit, it didn’t smell cement. I have a few concrete flower pots, so I know how they smell.
I was looking at many sites, reading concrete vs stone. I think mine is probably a lava stone, maybe not a basalt, I read they are really dark and probably much harder.
Tomorrow will be onto the seasoning stage, with rice. Getting really excited!
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I just bought a new granite mortar and pestle. I previously had a marble one, but it was on the small side and I needed a larger one. Also, I always had a problem with the marble M+P trying to clean it and keep the odors to a minimum. Whenever I ground spices in it, odors from the spices and herbs would linger. I got frustrated one time and soaked it in vinegar to see if that worked. The vinegar ended up badly etching the marble surface. Another time I tried letting it sit with baking soda, hoping this would absorb the odors. It just ended up creating a residual crust of baking soda that I could never quite completely remove., so anything I ground in it would taste slightly salty.
So now I have a brand new larger granite M+P (Hi-Coup, bought on Amazon). It’s beautiful. Following the instructions I came across on youtube, I seasoned it by grinding dried rice in it. Now I’m wondering how to keep it clean and minimize the odors and oils from herbs and spices.
Do I just rinse it with water? Should I clean it with dish soap? Or should I just wipe it out? Would putting flour or starch in it help absorb odors?
I’m not sure what to answer here. I have two marble mortars and pestles, a fairly small one cup one and a larger three cup one and honestly I have never had problems with lingering flavors and odors, as I had previously with the wooden one I had been using originally on the recommendation of my Puerto Rican neighbor/cooking instructor. I love the marble M&Ps because you can easily spatula out all the ingredients from the mortar and because they are so easily cleaned with soap and water.
Maybe a brass or stainless steel one would work better for you.
And maybe a better question would be, what were you grinding that had such a penetrating odor?
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Stone is prone to staining when exposed to acidic and oily foods.
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i prefer wooden or Stone mortars and pestles.
I have mine for years.
The big wooden one I use for my Genovese Basil Pesto …
The Stone one, called a Molcajete (Aztec) from Mexico many years ago, is for guacamole or salsa piquant, mojo picon for Canary Island Style Potatoes and my Romesco …
I only use the enormous one for my Genovese Basil Pesto …
I own several different sized wooden ones …
I have a granite mortar and pestle. I wash it with a perfume-free dish soap. Haven’t had any problems.
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And maybe a better question would be, what were you grinding that had such a penetrating odor?
Just regular herbs and spices. It wasn’t a strong odor, but I could often smell whatever I last ground in the marble M+P and it would sometimes affect the taste of the next grind if I ground say, several stronger spices together and then the next day ground a single milder herb in it. Even if I washed the mortar, I could still smell/ taste something ‘slightly more’ than the mild herb the next day.
We own a small 2 cup marble m&p version probably 30 yrs old. its deep enough for grinding by hand. washes up beautifully. i would use a deep wood bowl for anything of larger quantity.
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