Recommendations for mixers and mills

I've been baking bread, mixing by hand never with a mixer or bread machine, and I'd like to take it to the next step.

I've been looking at mixers and there are so many and too much advertising material for each.

Anyone have a source or suggestion on a good mixer, in the $400 price range, that can handle heavy doughs without burning up?

Also, been thinking about milling my own flours. What's the best way to get started in that endeavor?

Thanks, Todd

Reply to
tfiedler
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Try posting this on alt.bread.recipes

Reply to
graham

I have a Kitchen Aid 6qt mixer and it works great. I've mixed double batches of whole wheat bread dough without a problem!

Reply to
Barbara

Barbara wrote in news:2didg.6095$oa3.1329@trnddc08:

Barb

What model do you have?

Thanks, Todd

Reply to
tfiedler

Another important question would be, "what's a double batch, in cups of flour?" KA measures the "flour power" of their mixers in cups of flour, and asks that you use only half that when you use whole wheat. So, depending on the mixer and the recipe, the double batch could be less than the maximum recommended by KA.

If you don't use the same recipe, you could seriously overload the mixer and wonder why it stopped running shortly after all the smoke came out of the mixer (that was an intentional, and hopefully amusing, exaggeration).

Mike

Reply to
Mike Avery

I have the Professional 600 Series 6 qt. I made a "double batch" of dough requiring 3 cups of bread flour and 3 cups whole wheat. The KA came with a recipe booklet and a recipe for Whole Grain Wheat Bread calls for 5-6 cups whole wheat flour, which makes 2 loaves. The booklet DOES say not to add more than the maximum amount of flour specified but gives the reason as "a dry loaf will result". Under "Bread Making Tips" it says to "NEVER use recipes calling for more than 12 cups all-purpose flour or 8 cups whole wheat flour when making dough with a 6-quart mixer."

The 6 qt. bowl is very large and doesn't work well for small batches of things like whipping less than 6 egg whites for example (KA hand mixer's job) but handles everything else (big batches of oatmeal raisin cookies, brownies, cake mixes, etc) with ease.

HTH

Barbara

Reply to
Barbara

Barbara wrote on 27 May 2006 in rec.food.baking

I think it is all relative...When "Mom" made bread it was 10-12 loaves at a time in a large aluminum bowl...by hand...To her making a double batch would involve getting out the extremely large bowl (AKA as the washtub) and making 20-24 loaves. I think batch is a poor measurement describer.

Reply to
Mr Libido Incognito

I use a Magic Mill and a Bosh.. Magic Mill is pretty amazing to the point of being entertaining to watch.

Reply to
ZerkonX

If the double batch requires 3 cups of bread flour and 3 cups of whole wheat, that is a rather small double batch. Different recipes, and different people, set the size for a double batch at different points. Like "hot" in "hot sauce", there aren't any hard and fast rules here which is why I asked about the size of your double batch - I was concerned other people would double their batch size without doing the math.

A quick look at the KA web page,

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shows that thePro 600 6qt mixer has a "flour power" of 14 cups. However, when using allor part whole grain flour, they suggest de-rating that to 1/2 of the fullsize. So, with the recipe you mentioned, the limit would be 7 cups of flourin the Pro 600 6qt model. In short, the recipe is pretty close to the edgeof what the Pro 600 can handle, and would be beyond what many of theirmixers can safely handle on a regular basis. The KA came with a recipe booklet and a recipe for Whole Grain Wheat Bread

There are two separate issues here. Many recipes tell you to add flour and knead until the dough is silky smooth and feels like a baby's bottom. If the dough isn't dry enough, it will climb up the dough hook in a KA. You can deal with that using a chopstick to push the dough down, or by adding flour. If you add too much flour, the loaf will be dry and crumbly. In fact, you are better off, for most breads, with a much wetter dough and dealing with the dough climbing issue in ways that don't involve adding more flour. As Beatrice Ojakangas says in her "Great Whole Grain Breads" book, "dough would rather be a bit too wet than a bit too dry".

The other issue is not exceeding the rated capacity of the mixer. If you get a Hobart mixer's manual, they specify the capacity of the mixer by weight, and it changes based on what you are mixing. You can beat a lot of egg whites, mix a lot of cake batter, make less wet bread dough, and much less pizza, bagel or challah dough. The thickness of the dough, often measured by it's hydration, gives you an indication of how hard the mixer will have to work to mix the dough. And, even with a commercial mixer, the limits that are well below the maximum volume of the mixer because dough is harder to mix than egg whites.

KitchenAid seems to have decided that their typical customer can't cope with the density of the dough charts, so they simplify and say, "The flour power of this mixer is 14 cups". It's probably a reasonable simplification for most of their customers.

Under "Bread Making Tips" it says to "NEVER use recipes calling for more

That's pretty much what I said. They may have changed that over the years, the current web page says 14 cups of all purpose flour for this model.

The manual also warns you not to make more than two batches back to back, and to let the mixer cool for 45 minutes after the second batch.

Mike

Reply to
Mike Avery

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