Which appliance do you use when you have to blend or grind a small quantity of food - so not enough to work in the vitamix?

E.g. I had to blend 1/2 avocado with basil and garlic for a sauce, so I need an appliance with really low blades :) I'm not interested in smoothies, maybe this info can help!

I generally use my immersion blender for small amounts - or my spice grinder. Depends upon what the item is.

Buy the small (32) oz Vitamix container. Works just fine for smaller amounts.

My magic bullet is 5 years old and going strong. Cheap and reliable and great for grinding or mixing like salad dressings. My cuis hand blender also came with a great attachment that's designed to ground nuts but works great on everything else.

My breville stick blender came with a small cup and an attachment to turn it into a mini processor. I love it for small amounts of ingredients. For spices, I use my 25 yo coffee grinder.

A Cuisinart "mini prep". It lives on the counter top and gets used all the time.
Also...I bought a used "nutribullet' that works surprisingly well. It's used for single serving smoothies and salad dressing.

I use a sunbeam mini processor (about 1 cup-still available on ebay) sometimes, or a regular 5-6 cup mini processor, but they don't really grind the same way as a blender. My ancient but still good Osterizer came with small (1-2c.) blender jars, and I assume others do too, but I always found them pretty frustrating to use because you can't get in to stir easily. I'm curious as to what actually happens with the Vitamix- the Osterizer will blend very small quantities- you just need enough to cover the blade- but material sticking to the sides of the jar can be a problem.

I have a little electric coffee bean grinder that I use for grinding spices. Picked it up at a yard sale for $8 (!). Kinda looks like this, http://www.target.com/p/bodum-bistro-electric-coffee-grinder/-/A-21464667?ref=tgt_adv_XS000000&AFID=google_pla_df&CPNG=PLA_Appliances%2BShopping&adgroup=SC_Appliances_Coffee+Grinders&LID=700000001170770pgs&network=g&device=c&location=9032135&gclid=CIKwsrOy0ssCFYeUfgodBKkL7A&gclsrc=aw.ds

Or I use my little mortar & pestle for the really small quantities (like ~2 TB).

What about an immersion blender .... Some models come with a measuring cup and are perfect for small quantities , not as good as a vitamix but may work for you

I use a Ninja Blender system and the smoothie attachment works great for small batches.