I had been mulling over the possibility of getting a stand mixer for months. At Christmas I finally decided to take the plunge and carefully picked over the options. The KitchenAid Artisan mixer looks beautiful. However, the Kenwood Chef gets a better write-up for performance and so I eventually convinced myself to go practical over pretty.
It put me in a bad mood immediately as it had a “5 year guarantee” sticker on the side that is incredibly difficult to get off. I had to peel it, then scratch it with my nail, then scrub it several times to get it off. Since then the whole experience has been far more positive however.
The box is massive. Probably because there is a stand mixer, a food processor and a blender in the box.
The main reason I wanted a stand mixer was to allow me to make continental bread and enriched doughs, which often require a long machine kneading. I got to work straight away.
Fifteen minutes of kneading feels like a really long time. However it actually does take that long to pick up all the dough onto the hook and give it a good spin.
Ciabatta requires fifteen minutes of kneading as well. Elina thinks it looks really ugly. However, it is pretty much supposed to look that way. It also tastes great. In general, it’s nice to be able to throw everything into the mixing bowl and have it mix them for me.
I have also tried beating cake ingredients using the k-beater and Elina has tried the whisk for making meringues, both with success. After you are done, it is super easy to clean. Everything is stainless steal, so I just throw everything in the bowl and fill it with hot soapy water.
The food processor sits on the top. This comes with the standard food processor blades, which I used to make the mayo that accompanied these squid rings. Even better, it comes with a set of six cutting disks that allow you to slice and grate.
So far, so good. I am using it more than I expected. Time will tell if it was worth the money, but it is proving a good purchase so far.
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Tags: baking, bread, cake, kenwood, stand mixer
This entry was posted on Friday, February 26th, 2016 at 11:10 am and is filed under Food, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.