A peppermill, or pepper grinder, is a must-have tool in the kitchen.  Freshly ground pepper is to ground and bottled pepper as fresh pressed garlic is to dried and ground garlic, that is, flat and wholly lacking in intensity.  Fortunately, grinding fresh pepper is a lot easier than peeling, cutting and pressing whole garlic.  All you need to do is to add a peppermill to your kitchen counter top and keep it filled with whole pepper corns. 

I've gone through maybe four peppermills over the years.  They either wear out or get too grungy.  Peugeot, in France, has always made the best selling milling mechanisms and many manufacturers use them.  They work fine but are not precisely adjustable.  The one I just tossed out had a Peugeot mill that wore out only because the no-name manufacturer misaligned it, with the result that it ground itself up.   
 

Now there is a better peppermill out there or, at least, a new peppermill of choice.  Cooks Illustrated did a review of kitchen peppermills awhile back and found the Unicorn's Magnum Plus was the clear winner with a superior range of grinds, large capacity and "blinding speed." 

So, I got one last week.  

It is a very good peppermill, the best I've ever used.  It holds a half cup of pepper corns and, when loaded, has good heft and balance.  The grind is easily adjustable from medium-fine to course, by means of a thumb screw on the bottom. They are made in Nantucket by Tom Davis, Inc. As the photo shows, they come in a range of models from the large Magnum Plus, to medium sized ones that take a quick-draw holster for restaurant waitstaff, to a pocket sized mill for pepper addicts.  All of them use Italian milling mechanisms.  The big one goes for $45.00 with the lowest shipping and handling fee ($4.00) I've seen in years.  They sell direct at www.peppergun.com.