A hand mixer is a small hand-held mixing kitchen appliance that is made up of a set of beaters fixed to a gear-driven machine to rotate the blades of the beaters. Hand mixers are used for blending ingredients, which required a smooth functioning set of blades that turn easily and consistently during the mixing process. A handle is mounted over a case containing the motor. The motor drives the beaters which are immersed in the food to perform the mixing action. The motor may be light in weight as it is supported by you during use. You may use any suitable mixing bowl to hold the ingredients while mixing.
What do you use Hand Mixer for ?
Mixing is a basic cooking skill, though there are many ways to achieve it. The easiest, of course, often involves nothing but a spoon; the most advanced usually involves high-powered machinery. A hand mixer usually gets to somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. It uses electrical power to mix at high speeds and with accuracy and precision, usually as small as the touch of a button. Here is a list of the thing you can do with a hand mixer:
- It can be used to whip cream into fluffy clouds.
- It can be used to mix cake batter.
- It can be use to whip boiled potatoes.
- It can be used to make icing for your cake.
- It can be used to make meringue
- It can be used to mix cookie dough.
- It can be used to whip eggs into peaks.
Though, they can be limitations. Batters or foods with a heavy consistency can be hard to mix with a hand mixer. It depends on the softness of foods and the power of the hand mixer. For example kneading bread dough needs a more powerful stand mixer.
Also, some ingredients should not be mixed using a hand mixer. For example, when making chocolate chip cookies, the chips should be mixed into the dough by hand at the very end. If you use your electric hand mixer for that task can easily and quickly burn up the motor. The same happens to other hard ingredients like nuts and some fruits.
What speed is the best on a hand mixer ?
It depends on what you are going to mix though remember to follow your recipe if it demands a different speed. Here’s exactly what speed to choose for your cooking or baking ;
- LOW: This speed is for your slow mixing needs. It’s best for stirring and combining. You might use it for adding dry ingredients, like flour, to a batter or when adding wet ingredients to dry. You should also always start at this setting before increasing your speed.
- LOW-MEDIUM: light-heavy batters work best at this speed. You can use it to mix cookie doughs and batters and pound cakes.
- MEDIUM: The middle speed is great for creaming butter and beating frosting or mashed potatoes. It’s also the right speed to use if you need to finish a batter by mixing it well.
- MEDIUM-HIGH: This speed is good for fast beating or whipping. You can use it to make meringues or to beat frostings or mashed potatoes at a higher speed.
- HIGH: The highest speed is perfect for whipping cream and egg whites.
Types of Hand Mixer
There are several types of hand mixers available and these should not be confused with stand mixers. Most hand mixers don’t have the same kind of power but are fabulous for lots of everyday baking and cooking applications. They can also usually be stored in a drawer or cupboard when not in use, whereas larger stand mixers take up much more room and might be impractical when counter space or storage options are limited.
Manual Hand mixer
This does not demand electricity. It requires handling turning in order to make two whisks spin and beat eggs or other ingredients. In places where electric power is not accessible, eggbeaters still have their place. It’s not a bad choice to have one on hand, where it might be useful in a sudden power failure, for camping trips, or on vacations to verdant locales.
Electric hand mixer
Electric hand mixer makes use of electrical power to blend ingredients. From our research, we discovered different types of electric hand mixers.
1. Cordless Hand mixer
Almost all hand mixers are electric, which means that their motors are powered by electrical currents. This hand mixer does not have cords. This model can park in a charging station that’s connected to AC power and, once their inbuilt battery pack is charged, they can be used any place and in any space, without having to be plugged in. Most cordless hand mixers have a single blade but may come with a set of different blades. They might not be quite as powerful, and they do need to be stored in a cradle so they’re fully charged and ready for use. However, many feel they’re a special improvement upon older styles because they lack that irritating cord.
2. Hand blender
The hand blender is just a single spinning device, which may nevertheless prove useful in various situations. It can also double as a blender in some cases and make things like milkshakes.
3. Double blead hand mixer
The two-blade mixer is most common and turns out to have better usefulness. Hand mixers can easily mix cake batter, make meringue, whip cream, or create the frosting.
single blead hand mixer
The single-bladed hand blender may not have quite as many applications as the various types of hand mixers. Some do come with sharp blade accessories that can be used chop nuts, and they can easily whip cream or egg whites. They tend not to do as good a job mixing up large cake batters though, but they are quite often small, and easy to store.
Hand Mixer Attachments and their uses
There are different types of hand mixer attachments. It would be confusing to tell the difference between different attachments that come with a hand mixer. Here are the most common types of attachments that come along with a hand mixer.
Turbo Beater
Turbo beaters come in handy when you want to blend some eggs for breakfast. Strip beaters also help to mix thick fluids smoothly.
Whisk
Whisks are used to blend ingredients into a smooth texture. These are commonly used to whip egg whites into the thick foam to make meringue, and cream into whipped cream. It can even be used for whipping egg whites that can be used for fluffy frostings and light chiffon cakes. There are different types of whisks that serve different purposes when it comes to cooking.
The most commonly found whisk is a balloon whisk which is shaped like a wide teardrop. Some hand mixer comes with a balloon whisk which can be used to whisk eggs and make your coffee milk foam.
Other types of whisks include a French whisk, gravy whisk, flat whisk, cage whisk, etc.
Blending Rod
This is usually shaped in the form of a long rod with a sharpened circular end. This rod is mainly for making fresh homemade juice.
Hope our article gave you a clear picture of the different kinds of attachments that come along with a hand mixer.
Dough Hook
Since Christmas is almost here, a dough hook will be the most needful hand mixer attachment if you are planning to bake. However, note that if you are making a large cake, the tiny hand mixer is going to take great of your time to mix the cake batter for you.
A hand mixer should be chosen depending on your purpose. It is a convenient tool at home that can make whipping, mixing, and blending food easy for you. Making some whipped cream for breakfast, a smoothie to carry to work or some meringue for dessert can all be easily carried out with a hand mixer.
But, do note that a hand mixer is not very convenient for mixing batter to bake cakes unless you are making small ones. Since a hand mixer is hand-held, mixing cake batter can tire your hands because it can take you much time to get the batter mixed and ready.
