FryBoy
New member
I made a Lemon Pound Cake this afternoon -- more on that later. However, I though it would be a good opportunity to tell others about the improved beater I purchased for my KitchenAid Pro 600 Stand Mixer (the mixer cost me all of $49, including tax, new in the box, from Macy's -- but that's yet another story).
One thing many KitchenAid mixer owners complain about is that it's difficult to scrape the bowl while the mixer is running. Because the beater rotates around the inside of the bowl, and because the beater doesn't actually touch the bowl, you have to stop the mixer frequently to scrape the sides of the bowl to make sure all the ingredients are well incorporated.
Two companies have come up with fixes for that problem -- the BeaterBlade+ and the SideSwipe. They are available for most KA mixers. Cook's Magazine tested both in January 2009 and liked the SideSwipe a tad more than the BeaterBlade because they thought it performed a little better on a particularly heavy cookie dough, but one reviewer on another forum commented that dough tends to bunch up on the SideSwipe's inner parts.
In any case, I have the BeaterBlade+, mainly because it was available from Amazon for $30, no tax, free shipping, and I didn't feel like driving around to find the other.
Both are made of very strong plastic and have silicone scrapers on the edges of the blades. The scrapers do touch the bowl and thus provide a constant scraping of the ingredients, assuring that everything gets mixed in. I've found that I rarely have to stop the mixer, except to make sure that the ingredients that cling to the beater itself are mixed in.
Here's that they look like:
This is the BeaterBlade+:
This is the SideSwipe:
Here's a photo of the BeaterBlade in action, creaming butter and sugar for my pound cake, and another of it mixing the completed cake batter -- note how clean the bowl is immediately behind the beater's edges (the bottom is scraped well, too):
There are also several videos available of the BeaterBlade and the SideSwipe in action on YouTube.
The BeaterBlade does a great job, and I'm sure the SideSwipe does, too. I highly recommend them for frequent bakers.
One thing many KitchenAid mixer owners complain about is that it's difficult to scrape the bowl while the mixer is running. Because the beater rotates around the inside of the bowl, and because the beater doesn't actually touch the bowl, you have to stop the mixer frequently to scrape the sides of the bowl to make sure all the ingredients are well incorporated.
Two companies have come up with fixes for that problem -- the BeaterBlade+ and the SideSwipe. They are available for most KA mixers. Cook's Magazine tested both in January 2009 and liked the SideSwipe a tad more than the BeaterBlade because they thought it performed a little better on a particularly heavy cookie dough, but one reviewer on another forum commented that dough tends to bunch up on the SideSwipe's inner parts.
In any case, I have the BeaterBlade+, mainly because it was available from Amazon for $30, no tax, free shipping, and I didn't feel like driving around to find the other.
Both are made of very strong plastic and have silicone scrapers on the edges of the blades. The scrapers do touch the bowl and thus provide a constant scraping of the ingredients, assuring that everything gets mixed in. I've found that I rarely have to stop the mixer, except to make sure that the ingredients that cling to the beater itself are mixed in.
Here's that they look like:
This is the BeaterBlade+:
This is the SideSwipe:
Here's a photo of the BeaterBlade in action, creaming butter and sugar for my pound cake, and another of it mixing the completed cake batter -- note how clean the bowl is immediately behind the beater's edges (the bottom is scraped well, too):
There are also several videos available of the BeaterBlade and the SideSwipe in action on YouTube.
The BeaterBlade does a great job, and I'm sure the SideSwipe does, too. I highly recommend them for frequent bakers.
