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Breville Fresh & Furious BBL620 Blender – What Happened To The Hemiphere Model?

The Breville Fresh & Furious BBL620 Blender was introduced to the market in 2018 as a replacement of the Breville

 

Credit: Breville USA

With the addition of the Green Smoothie mode, the Fresh & Furious has 3 automatic blending modes, while the Hemisphere has only two. The Fresh & Furious also have 5 different manual speeds, just like the Hemisphere. The latest version of the Fresh & Furious is also compatible with the Breville Vac Q air vacuum system (sold separately) that is designed to make creamier, tastier smoothies and other blended food and drinks by removing air out of the blender jar before blending.

The biggest difference between these two Breville blender models, however, is the power of the blender motors. The Fresh & Furious is rated at 1,100 watts, the Henipshere only 750. So, the Fresh & Furious has almost 50% more power than the Hemisphere, at least as measured by watts.

If you’d like to check current pricing now for the Fresh & Furious, you can see it on Amazon here with free shipping options and any discounts. Keep reading for the rest of the review.

To skip to any part of this review that most interests you, use the table of contents below to choose where you want to go.

New Kitchen Life is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Where Is Breville Based & How Old Is It?

Breville is an Australian designer and manufacturer of small appliances that started in 1932 when Harry Norville and Bill O’Brien combined their names to create the Breville name. Breville started in radios, then televisions before it moved into the small kitchen appliances that it is best known for today.

Breville has grown dramatically over time and has been awarded over 100 patents and 40 international awards. Bill O’Brien’s son John was involved with creating Breville’s research and development lab from which so many products and product innovations have come from. John’s daughter Barbara headed up Breville’s marketing during the 1990s to make her the third generation from the O’Brien family to work at Breville.

Breville made a name for itself in Australia when it introduced the “toastie” sandwich maker in 1974. From there, Breville expanded internationally to Great Britain and other countries before reaching the USA and Canada in the early 2000s.

Breville has introduced several successful small appliances to the USA since, including the Breville Smart Oven Air countertop oven (you can read our review of the Breville Smart Oven Air here).

In addition to the Fresh & Furious blender reviewed here, you can also see our reviews of two more recent, premium Breville blenders, the Q and the Super Q in our reviews of them, the Q reviewed here and the Super Q reviewed here. You can also see how the Super Q compares with other premium blenders in our review of these top blenders here. We also reviewed Breville’s personal blender, the Breville Boss To Go Sport here.

So What Is It About The Breville Fresh & Furious From The Hemisphere?

The Breville Fresh & Furious BBL620 is one of Breville’s newest blenders, and as described above, is a replacement for the older Breville Hemisphere Control Blender BBL605.

The most important improvement that Breville made to the Breville Hemisphere in the Fresh & Furious blender is a much more poweruful 1,100 watt blender motor to better blend, chop and mince frozen fruits and vegetables and other dense foods. The Hemisphere’s blender motor is rated at 750 watts.

The Fresh & Furious 50-ounce blender jar is also slightly larger than the 48-ounce jar in the Hemisphere. The Hemisphere only has two automatic functions, Ice Crush and Smoothie functions, but the Fresh & Furious has Ice Crush, Smoothie, and also Green Smoothie. Green Smoothie is designed for breaking down whole fruits and vegetables into a smoothie that is full of fiber and other nutrients.

image of Breville Fresh & Furious BBL620 Blender Damson Blue

Credit: Breville USA

Unlike the Hemisphere blender, the latest versions of the Fresh & Furious are also designed to work with Breville’s Vac Q vacuum pump. The Vac Q will remove all of the air in the Fresh & Furious blender jar before blending, and stop automatically once the air is removed to make creamier, more colorful and generally better tasting smoothies and other drinks. It fits on top of the inner ring of the blender lid, where the measuring cup sits. You can see the Vac Q on Amazon here if you’d like.

image of Breville Vac Q in use

Credit: Breville USA

The Fresh & Furious also has an Auto-Clean function that will run through a cleaning cycle in your blender, the Hemisphere does not have this feature.

What Else About The Fresh & Furious?

The Fresh & Furious also has five manual speeds just like the Hemisphere has, and comes in seven colors (see the section below about each color and options for finding your preferred one).

Another thing to consider about the Fresh & Furious, as well as almost all Breville blenders, is the built-in design elements that Breville packs into their products. In the blender lid is an inner ring with a removable measuring cup to help you add just the right amount of ingredients to your blend.

The ring on the outer part of the lid, the Breville Assist, is designed for you to pull with your finger to make it easier to get the lid off after blending, especially after suction from blending has created a vacuum inside the blender jar.

 

image of Breville Fresh & Furious Lid

Credit: Breville USA

The Fresh & Furious even has an Assist feature built into the electrical plug, another ring to use with your finger to pull the plug out of the socket when you want to unplug the blender.

How Do You Operate The Fresh & Furious?

You can run the blender through one of three automatic modes, or manually with five different speed settings.

The automatic modes are selected by pressing any of the buttons on the top of the control panel, from left to right, labeled “GREEN SMOOTHIE”, “AUTO PULSE | ICE CRUSH” and “SMOOTHIE”.

image of Breville Fresh & Furious Control Panel

Credit: Breville USA

The automatic modes run the blender motor at different speeds for 60 seconds each.

Green Smoothie – Green Smoothie mode is designed to break down leafy greens, seeds, and whole fruits and vegetables and blend into a usually green drink.

Auto Pulse | Ice Crush – Auto Pulse | Ice Crush mode uses the blender’s highest motor speed, pulsing repeatedly, to crush ice or breakdown other solid food into small bits.

Smoothie – Smoothie mode runs the blender motor at high speed and then low speed to first break down fruits and other foods and then blend them together into a creamy drink with a smooth texture.

The LCD screen on the right side of the control panel will count down from 60 seconds in each of the automatic modes to let you know how much time is left in the blending cycle.

For manual operation, choose one of the five numbered buttons on the bottom of the control panel. These five numbered and labeled speeds, start with “1 – MIX”, the slowest speed, “2 – CHOP”, “3 – BLEND”, “4 – PUREE” and end with “5 – LIQUIFY” the fastest speed.

When you start blending with one of the five manual speeds, the LCD screen on the right side will begin to count how long you’ve been blending and stop automatically after 60 seconds. This automatic shutdown is a safety feature to prevent the motor from overheating. If you still need more time to blend, you just have to wait for a few seconds for the LCD to go back to “00”.

What Can You Blend With The Fresh & Furious?

There’s a lot of things you can blend with your Breville Fresh & Furious, some pretty obvious, but other things may not have occurred to you and a sample of what you can do is described here, more for the range of blending than as a complete list.

Minced Raw Vegetables – Use manual 1-MIX speed to process up to about 2 cups of vegetables of your choice for meal prep, for just eating raw or some other use. Blend for anywhere from 10 to 30 seconds depending on how fine or coarse you want your vegetables to be.

Mayonnaise – Start with 1/2 cup of egg yolks and vinegar at manual 1-MIX speed for 10 to 15 seconds, then increase speed to 3-BLEND for 60 seconds, or until it’s the consistency that you prefer. While at blend speed, add use the measuring cup in the inner ring to slowly add oil through the opening in the inner ring until the combined ingredients start to look like your preferred mayonnaise texture.

Bread Or Cookie Crumbs – Use manual 1-MIX speed to make crumbs out of 1 cup of 1-inch squares of bread or cookies and blend for 10 to 30 seconds, based on how small you need your crumbs to be for a cheesecake, regular cake, or any other recipe calling for crumbs.

Ground Nuts – Use manual 1-MIX speed to chop up to 1 1/2 cups of your choice of nuts until they are chopped the way you like them, including into a paste or nut butter with toasted nuts and some oil.

Whipped Cream – Start with 1 1/4 cup of heavy cream (add sugar and vanilla optional) at manual 1-MIX speed for 10 to 20 seconds, then switch to Auto Pulse | Ice Crush and pulse for a few seconds until you see soft peaks forming.

Carrot Drink  – Use manual 5-LIQUIFY speed with up to cups of carrots sliced into 1/2 inches in up to 30 ounces of water and blend for 30 seconds to create a carrot drink.

Herbs – Use manual 1-MIX speed for 20 to 30 seconds to turn up to 1 1/4 cups of your choice of herbs into a paste.

Smoothie – Add your favorite smoothie ingredients, frozen fruit, juice, ice, and any other ingredients into the blender jar (up to 4 3/4 cups) and select the Smoothie automatic mode. It will run through its cycle, counting down from 60 seconds.

Fruit Puree – Use manual 3-BLEND speed with up 2 cups of berries or other fruit for 20 to 30 seconds to make a dessert puree or to cover your waffles or pancakes.

Mince Dried Fruit – Use manual 1-MIX speed with up 2 cups of dried fruit for 20 to 30 seconds to mince dried fruit into small as defined in certain recipes.

Crush Ice – Add 1 cup of ice cubes to the blender jar and select Auto Pulse | Ice Crush. The blender will start to countdown on the LCD screen from 60 seconds and when it’s done you’ll have finely crushed ice.

NOTE: When you’re blending dry ingredients like grains, coffee, grains, some kinds of nuts and spices, even sugar, these ingredients will cloud your blender jar over time from the oils or other residues in some dry ingredients. If you know that you will regularly blend a lot of dry ingredients, it probably makes sense for you to buy a separate blender jar just for them. That way you can keep your other jar clean for everything else.

What Color Options Are There With The Fresh & Furious?

The Fresh & Furious comes in seven colors. These colors are – Silver, Black Truffle, Smoked Hickory, Sea Salt, Royal Champagne, Damson Blue, and Oyster Shell.

The most common color for sale on Amazon (you can see it here) is Silver and other colors may or may not be available. If you prefer other colors, the best option is to buy directly from Breville. Here is a link to the Breville Fresh & Furious page with the current price, and each of the seven color options is above the Add To Cart button.

What Is The Breville Fresh & Furious Horsepower?

Breville doesn’t detail the Fresh & Furious horsepower as some other blender makers do. So, if you want to compare the Fresh & Furious power in horsepower to other blenders, then you have to calculate it from the rated electrical power in watts that is provided by Breville. The Fresh & Furious is rated at 1,100 watts.

There are 746 watts in one horsepower, so to find the specific horsepower of the Fresh & Furious, divide the rated power, 1,100 watts by 746 watts, and that result is 1.47. So, the Fresh & Furious has 1.47 or about 1 1/2 horsepower.

The Breville Fresh & Furious Auto Clean Function & Is It Dishwasher Safe?

The AUTO CLEAN half-circle button on the left side of the control panel will start a self-clean cycle. To begin, add about 2 cups of warm but not hot water to the blender jar along with a couple of drops of liquid detergent (or liquid bleach to sanitize). Press the AUTO CLEAN button and the blender will run its cleaning cycle and stop when it is finished.

You can put the blender jar and the lid in a dishwasher on the dishwasher’s standard wash cycle. Use the bottom drawer or tray of the dishwasher for the blender jar and use the top tray or drawer or tray for the blender lid.

Breville does caution that the repeated use of the dishwasher, given its high heat and pressure, will wear out your blender faster than handwashing it, so if you don’t mind handwashing it, at least some of the time, you’re likely to make your blender last longer.

What About The Fresh & Furious Warranty?

The Fresh & Furious comes with a 3-year warranty, about average for blenders in its price range. By contrast, Breville’s Super Q blender has a 10-year warranty, about as long of a warranty as you can get in blenders.

The warranty covers defects, and not normal wear and tear. It also doesn’t cover you if you’re using it in a retail shop or if you’re using it commercially.

Breville will either repair, replace, or reimburse you for the blender’s value at the time it fails, Breville’s choice when you use your warranty. California residents have additional options that you can see in the warranty details.

Amazon usually has extended warranty options for up to four years. It’s probably worth buying a four-year extended warranty with the Fresh & Furious to get that extra year of coverage.

Fresh & Furious Specifications & What’s In The Box?

Dimensions: 8.5” wide x 6.9″ deep x 15.7″ high

Container Material: BPA-Free Tritan® jar

Electrical: 120 V, 9.2 Amps, 1,100 watts

Colors: Silver, Black Truffle, Smoked Hickory, Sea Salt, Royal Champagne, Damson Blue, and Oyster Shell

Weight: 8.8 pounds

Included In The Box: Motor Base, 50-ounce Blender Jar and Two-Part Lid, and Instruction Manual.

What Do We Recommend About The Fresh & Furious?

The Fresh & Furious is a solid blender that will do what you expect of a mid-range blender. It’s not a super premium blender like the Breville Q or even the Super Q, so it doesn’t have some of the more elaborate functions like automatic Soup mode and it has a 50-ounce blender jar instead of a 68-ounce jar, but then again, it’s priced much lower than those other Breville blenders.

Breville also includes some of the same design elements in the Fresh & Furious that are in the Breville Q and Super Q like the Auto-clean self-cleaning function and the Assist lid pull ring and another for the electrical plug.

Satisfied Fresh & Furious customers say it performs very well over time and even better than more expensive blenders, they also really like how it makes smoothies.

The Fresh & Furious has a 3-year standard warranty, which could be longer. If you have the option to buy a longer extended warranty, do it if it’s not too pricey.

You can see the Breville Fresh & Furious here on Amazon here with the latest pricing, warranty options, and any discounts.

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About the Author Sabrina

Sabrina is our head writer and expert researcher. She spends countless hours of research on each topic or product she writes about. She also tests products and recipes when she can and is known as a kitchen appliance junkie who is always trying new gadgets. Plus, she's a fairly decent cook above all else!