Conference turris::cooks

I have had a Sunbeam for about 10 years and love it; my Mom has had hers
for at least 25 years and has only replaced the beaters (I managed to break
one while trying to scrape the sides of the small bowl, oops).

I have some of the attachments too, that shred and grate -- they have been
my salvation when grating zucchini for bread or muffins, or to do cheese
for casseroles and the like.

I would  heartily recommend the Sunbeam, it has been very reliable and
does all the chores you mentioned; mine came with dough hooks which I have
never used but which I assume work well.



Jan  part_of_the_Sunbeam_tradition

  I used my mom's Sunbeam for years, but still haven't bought a "real"
  mixer since then, and am also interested in getting one now. The
  Kitchenaid is definitely a "yuppie" mixer, with that awesome, trendy,
  commercial look (though it says right on the side of the K5SS "for
  household use only). I'm sure it's very good, but is it really worth
  getting one over a Sunbeam? I notice that the Kitchenaid has a
  sausage-stuffer attachment, and my wife has been interested in making
  sausage for a while. Does the Sunbeam have such an attachment? Also,
  aside from possibly making tons of bread dough, is there any other
  reason why I'd need that much power?

    I don't know the Sunbeam but if it's a hand-held mixer, I would
    make sure it is strong enough to mix bread dough, at least to get
    you to the kneading stage.
    
    We have a Kitchenaid.  Even tho I'm not a yuppie and ours is the
    non-trendy white, it's a terrific machine for thorough mixing and
    (and I'm mixed about this) it will mix and knead bread dough thoroughly
    and with significantly less muscle strain.  (Hope that last sentence
    was comprehensible with all those "mix"es.)
    

    
    I've had a Kitchenaid for about 7 years now.  I debated getting
    it for about a year, then after one AWFUL day at work went and treated
    myself by buying it!  I've never regretted that decision.
     
    (I once took a pastry course through Cambridge Adult Ed.  The instructor
    was the head chef (or whatever they call them) at Bellecour in
    Lexington.  She STRONGLY recommended the Kitchenaid, which really
    swayed my opinion.)
    
    The only thing that's gone wrong with it is that I lost two of the
    little rubber "bumper-feet" in one of our moves.  I'm sure I could call
    the company and order more... just haven't gotten around to it!
    
    I've used it for kneading bread dough, but usually do that until
    just after it's mixed.  It certainly has the power to handle it,
    but I like the feel of kneading dough by hand.

    One bit of advice, regardless of which brand you buy.  Buy at least
    two of the bowls.  It makes life a whole lot easier when you're
    doing a lot of cooking and need to mix two things separately.

    Jennifer
        

    For a recent discussion of this very issue, see note 147 in
    OCTAVE::GADGETS.  
    
    re: .0 and pie crust
    
    Personally I prefer a pastry blender for pie crusts.  Now that I
    think about it, one of my motivations for getting the Kitchen-Aid
    5 quart model is that you can put a water bath (hot or cold) around
    the bowl, to maintain an appropriate temperature.  With pie crust,
    you really want to keep the dough cool, if not cold.  An ordinary
    mixer will melt the shortening, preventing a flaky crust.  I have
    yet to even buy the water bath, so I don't know whether the Kitchen-Aid
    with a cold water bath will actually do a decent job on a pie crust.
    I'll have to try it sometime; in the meantime, a pastry blender
    is cheap and very effective.

       Gary

    I have used the Kitchenaid mixer with most all of the bolt on
    goodies. And now I have the Mixmaster, with some of the attachments.
    I have used both for making bread and find that the Mixmaster 
    requires that you assist the mixing, as it does not mix the
    bottom of the bowl well. I think the Mixmaster does a good job on
    the kneading of the bread after you get it all together. The
    Kitchenaid will handle the load better then the Mixmaster. I would
    not try mixing more than 2 loaves at once in the Mixmaster. I have
    used the Kitchenaid for mixing 4 loaves at once (it was the big
    unit k5ss?). If you have the money buy the Kitchenaid.
    
    Bert
     

    
    
    I have both the Sunbeam and the Kitchen aid.  The Sunbeam is about
    30 years old and I had it completely overhauled about 5 years ago.
    I was told by the repairman that it was the second best machine
    on the market, the first being Kitchenaid. My mom used it for about
    16 or 17 years and then I used it for about 7 years. The reason
    I got a Kitchen aid is that the repair man said that My mixer had
    metal gears and that they were badly worn and not replaceable, the
    newer mixers had nylon gears. With the amount of cooking I do he
    felt that it wouldn't last long. My daughter is now using the Sunbeam.

    Thanks for all the good advice, especially the referral to the Gadgets
    note concerning Kitchenaid.  Think I'm going to wait for a sale
    and buy one.  I've recently had a negative experience with a Sunbeam
    iron that was supposed to turn itself off.  Think Sunbeam may be
    resting on its laurels.