Kitchen Stand Mixers - like Having an Extra Set of Hands

Remember what it was like to watch mom in the kitchen mixing up a batch of cookies or brownies? It was always fun to wait for her to be finished with the mixer so you could like the beaters of all the sweet cookie dough or brownie batter. And no one can argue the taste of good old home made fluffy mashed potatoes. Imagine how hard it must be to do all that by hand. Old style mixers were little more than gadgets that made it easier to avoid doing actual hand mixing with a large kitchen spoon or spatula. Kitchen stand mixers are such a handy little appliance, adding the convenience of being able to set the mixer to the proper time and power setting so you can get on with working on other food items around the kitchen.

Hand mixers have been around since the mid 1800's with the original device being a hand-cranked egg-beater type contraption that did little to alleviate the real effort of mixing food ingredients. Since then, the mixer has evolved into two distinct types, which are the hand-held mixer and the kitchen stand mixer. KitchenAid was the first company to develop electric kitchen stand mixers in 1919, which was to offer households a small countertop appliance with the same convenience many restaurants already enjoyed with larger industrial sized models. Since that time, KitchenAid has enjoyed a large share of the market for kitchen stand mixers, but other companies such as Cuisinart and Viking have developed their own products offering similar characteristics, convenience, and quality of design.

Stand mixers are designed to be like having an extra set of hands in the kitchen. Kitchen stand mixers are generally larger than their smaller cousins, the hand-held mixers, and have considerably more power as well. Most home-type stand mixers have a bowl capacity of anywhere between 1 to 7 quarts, and make it easy to add and pour ingredients while mixing. Most models typically are packaged with a wire whip, a flat beater, and a dough hook to start. Combined with the high power of most modern mixers, up to 1000 watts of output, even the most muscle cramping ingredients can be easily and efficiently mixed for smooth pouring batters and fluffy bread dough. Add to this the additional mixing ends and external attachments, and most higher-end models can double or triple as a meat grinder, past maker, juicer, or blender. Most modern kitchen stand mixers make it so you can virtually replace a large portion of all the extraneous appliances in your kitchen.

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