I read a lot of reviews on this grinder before I made my purchase. Thanks everyone for your reviews; they were very helpful! This grinder is phenomenal! I bought this Grinder and the foot pedal (a must have in my opinion) to prepare raw dog food for my new pup. This grinder whizzed through a whole chicken, I had hacked into manageable bits for the hopper, in a matter of minutes. Very impressed with the quality of the hopper the auger and the three grinding plates that come standard with it. They are heavy gauge stainless steel. The tray at the front, bottom portion of the unit is very handy for storing the different grinder plates and tools that come with the grinder. I used the large die and the medium dye to grind the chicken. I would not recommend grinding whole chicken feet as the auger immediately jammed. The foot got wound around the auger and stuck in the neck of the hopper all at the same time. It came apart fairly easily and I was back in business in no time. A lesson learned. I continued with the chicken feet grinding but only after I chopped them into manageable bits. My dog has a 2-week supply of dog food, in less time than it took to shop for the ingredients, thanks to this grinder! As a retired fine dining chef I appreciate good quality kitchen appliances and this is definitely top-notch! For the money you cannot go wrong! Hope this helps. I didn’t grind any meat without bones, but I can only imagine how fast it would dispatch a whole roast into nicely ground beef!