I churn my own butter now thanks to the Kenwood Go Stand Mixer

RRP at time of testing: £250 | Check price at Amazon, Argos, AO.com or Kenwood directly

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My verdict

Never one to put my hand up for baking, I’d be lying if I said I was ever any good at it. Food tech was not my subject at high school, let’s put it that way. I can just about cook with the help of an air fryer, and I am getting better at making things from scratch for my family and me, but baking is a different ball game. It has rules. It has measurements. It has consequences.

Every Christmas Eve, I bake chocolate chip cookies in honour of my sister. Every Christmas Eve, I somehow end up grief-stricken because I’ve burnt the bottom of them. It is a tradition, just not quite the cosy, twinkly one you see in adverts.

What I have learned while testing kitchen gadgets, though, is that baking is about precision rather than speed. Once I bought actual measuring cups, instead of winging it with a standard mug and blind optimism, I began to think I could perhaps do it. In my effort to be healthier and give my children more nutritious food and fewer ultra-processed snacks, I’ve found myself baking more often. I dare say I’ve even started to enjoy it.

The packaging matches the colour of the stand mixer - in my case, eucalyptus green

The Kenwood Go Stand Mixer has helped. Like a first car you’ll always remember, this is my first stand mixer, and honestly, it’s the perfect one for me.

I’m not a bake-every-day person. I’m more of a bake-everything-in-one-evening-and-prepare-snacks-for-the-week person. I don’t want to live with a stand mixer permanently on my counter, but I also don’t want to lug a huge one out of a cupboard every weekend either. That’s exactly where the Kenwood Go makes sense.

At 30cm tall, with a 4L bowl, built-in carry handle and retractable cable, it’s clearly been designed for smaller kitchens and people who want practicality over countertop grandeur. It’s compact, lightweight and easy to carry around the kitchen or tuck away after use, which means I actually use it instead of resenting it.

Kenwood says it can handle up to 48 cupcakes, pizza for four or a two-tier celebration cake and, in my house, it has mainly been used for homemade butter, muffin batter, cake batter and pizza dough.

Both my DC have enjoyed helping me make homemade muffins and cakes with the mixer

It won’t be roomy enough for serious batch bakers or anyone making huge loaves every weekend, but for nervous bakers, occasional bakers and busy parents trying to make more things from scratch, it’s a lovely gateway appliance. Not intimidating. Not enormous. Not so heavy that getting it out feels like a workout before you’ve even cracked an egg.

How I’ve tested

I tested the Kenwood Go Stand Mixer at home in a normal family kitchen, using it for the sort of things I actually make rather than the sort of things I like to imagine I make while wearing linen and listening to Radio 4.

Over the testing period, I used it to make cake batter, muffin batter and homemade butter from double cream. Butter has been the thing I’ve made most often with it, partly because it’s easy and partly because I like knowing exactly what’s in it. I’ve also used it for muffin and cake mixes, while my husband has used it to help knead pizza dough.

I tested the whisk, K-beater, dough tool, splashguard and bowl. I also paid attention to how easy it was to lift in and out of a cupboard, how noisy it felt at different speeds, how intuitive the controls were and whether it actually encouraged me to bake more often.

What comes with the Kenwood Go stand mixer?

In the box, you get:

• The mixer itself

• A 4L bowl

• K-beater

• Whisk

• Dough tool

• Splashguard

• Measuring spoon included, which doubles as a feed chute cover on the splashguard

You get everything you need to get started as a novice baker

That’s enough for the basics: cake batter, muffin mixes, buttercream, whipped cream, bread dough, pizza dough and, as I now know, homemade butter. There are no confusing extras that make you feel as though you need a diploma before you start.

The splashguard is particularly useful if you’re impatient or heavy-handed with cream, flour or icing sugar. I am both, depending on the day.

First impressions and set up 

The best thing about the Kenwood Go is that it doesn’t arrive looking like it expects you to be Mary Berry. Some stand mixers are gorgeous but faintly threatening.

This one feels more approachable. The shape is compact, the front-facing dial is obvious and the handle makes it easy to move around. There’s no drama to setting it up: choose your attachment, click the bowl in, add the splashguard if needed and turn the dial.

That simplicity matters. If you’re a confident baker, you probably don’t need hand-holding. If you’re someone who has previously considered “roughly half a mug” to be a measurement, you want an appliance that doesn’t make you feel silly before you begin.

It doesn’t take up too much space on your worktop, and can be stored easily in a cupboard

Why the Kenwood Go stand mixer suits small kitchens and reluctant bakers

This is where the Kenwood Go shines. It’s made for people who don’t have endless counter space or a giant pantry full of matching jars. Kenwood says it is 30cm tall and compact enough to fit in cupboards, deep pan drawers or tucked away in a corner. That has been true in my kitchen.

I can store it in a kitchen cupboard between uses without rearranging half the house. The built-in handle means I can get it out one-handed, which is much more useful than it sounds. The retractable cable also stops it becoming an irritating spaghetti situation in the cupboard.

This is not a stand mixer for people who want their appliance to be a permanent decorative feature. It’s for people who want the benefits of a stand mixer without sacrificing half the worktop.

How well does the Kenwood Go stand mixer perform day to day?

For my day-to-day use, it has performed exactly as I needed it to. My most regular test has been homemade butter. I pour double cream into the bowl, attach the whisk, add the splashguard and let it run on speed four. 600ml of double cream takes up to 10 minutes or so to churn. 

There are six speeds, but speed four became my sweet spot. It’s fast enough to get the job done without sounding like it’s about to take off. Speed six is powerful, but it is loud. Not “wake the neighbours” loud, but you’ll definitely need subtitles on the TV if you have an open plan living space like ours. I wouldn’t choose speed six for long unless I really needed it. Also, the soft-start feature helps avoid any flour explosions across the kitchen.

The splashguard has a built in feeder chute and measuring spoon

The butter has been the biggest success because it’s been a small homemade swap that busy parents like DH and I can actually sustain. I’m not pretending I’ve become someone who mills her own flour. I’m just making butter from cream and feeling mildly smug about knowing what’s in it.

If you’d told me a year ago that I’d be casually making my own butter in a stand mixer, I’d have laughed. Yet here we are. And yes, the Kenwood Go does it surprisingly well. 

For cake batter and muffin batter, it has also worked well. It mixes quickly and evenly enough for the family baking I’m doing. My blueberry muffins did turn out a bit chewy, but that was entirely my fault. I whisked the blueberries in rather than folding them through because, as established, I am still learning. The mixer cannot be blamed for my lack of muffin etiquette.

My husband has used it for pizza dough and found it useful there too. This is where it becomes more than a “nice to have” baking toy. If it can help with family pizza nights, snacks for the week and the odd cake, it starts to justify the cupboard space.

My youngest particularly loves watching it churn butter in real time

Mixing coverage and performance with real recipes

For cake and muffin batter, I found the mixing coverage good for everyday quantities. I didn’t notice large pockets of unmixed flour or ingredients stranded around the bowl. With any stand mixer, I still think it’s sensible to pause and check the sides, especially with thicker batters, but I didn’t feel I was constantly scraping down the bowl to rescue the recipe. 

This makes sense, though, given that Kenwood has designed the attachments to sit close to the bowl base, which probably explains why I wasn’t constantly chasing unmixed flour around the edges. 

The whisk attachment made easy work of double cream for butter. The change from liquid cream to whipped cream and then butter is oddly satisfying to watch, and the splashguard keeps the mess contained. Without it, I suspect I’d have redecorated the surrounding wall in dairy.

The dough tool was used for pizza dough and coped well for that family-sized job. I wouldn’t buy this expecting it to be a heavy-duty bread-making workhorse for enormous batches, but that isn’t really what it’s trying to be. 

Setting up and adding ingredients is easy and fuss-free thanks to the easy pour chute

Is the Kenwood Go easy to use for beginner bakers?

Yes, and this is probably its biggest strength. It feels approachable. The dial is on the front, which sounds like a tiny design detail until you’re using it in a small kitchen. You don’t need to twist the machine around or reach awkwardly down the side. 

Kenwood describes this as a “nose-on dial” designed to save space around the mixer, and in practice it does make it feel easier to use on a crowded counter.

The attachments are straightforward, the bowl is easy enough to fit and the splashguard is appreciated. The rotatable splashguard sounds niche until you’re trying to wedge yourself between a kettle, an air fryer and two children asking for snacks. 

I also like that it doesn’t demand too much from you. There are no endless settings or digital menus. You choose the attachment, choose the speed and get on with it.

For a beginner, that matters. I don’t need a machine that makes me feel like I’m operating factory equipment. I need something that helps me make snacks for the kids without losing the will to live.

It’s a little loud on setting four - it’s really loud on setting six

Is the Kenwood Go stand mixer easy to clean? 

Thankfully, yes. I don’t think enough people talk about the fact that a kitchen appliance can be brilliant in theory but still end up banished to the back of a cupboard because cleaning it feels like a punishment.

The Kenwood Go keeps things fairly painless. The 4L bowl feels manageable rather than enormous, which means I’m not wrestling a giant heavy mixing bowl into the sink after making muffins on a Monday night. The splashguard also does a decent job of containing mess, particularly when whipping cream or adding dry ingredients, so I haven’t found myself scraping flour off nearby surfaces every five minutes.

Because the mixer itself is compact, it’s also easier to wipe down and move around the kitchen than some bulkier stand mixers. I’ve mostly been making butter, cake batter and muffin mixes with it, and clean-up afterwards has felt realistic for everyday life.

The attachments are straightforward too. There aren’t endless fiddly components or awkward extras that make you regret baking in the first place. For beginner bakers especially, that simplicity makes a difference because it lowers the barrier to actually using the thing regularly.

Et voilà! Homemade butter to go with our homemade loaf of bread 

Can the Kenwood Go make bread dough?

Yes, within reason, and I think that distinction matters. The Kenwood Go is perfectly capable of handling everyday bread and pizza dough for normal family use, but it is not pretending to be an industrial bakery machine for people making six sourdough loaves every weekend. 

In our house, my husband has mainly used it for pizza dough before using our pizza oven, and it coped well with that sort of regular family cooking.

Kenwood recommends using the dough tool on lower speeds for kneading, which actually makes the mixer feel less frantic and easier to live with day to day. What I like is that the Go makes dough-making feel approachable rather than intimidating. Some larger stand mixers feel as though they expect you to own proving baskets and have opinions about hydration percentages. This one feels more realistic for busy parents who simply want homemade pizza night without kneading dough by hand for 15 minutes after work.

That said, if you bake heavy bread dough several times a week or regularly make huge batches, you’ll probably want a larger, more powerful stand mixer with a bigger bowl. The Kenwood Go sits more comfortably in the “casual but enthusiastic home baker” category than the serious artisan bread world.

We’ve also made banana bread and blueberry muffins with the help of the mixer

How stable is the Kenwood Go at higher speeds?

The Kenwood Go feels stable for the sort of everyday mixing I used it for. With cream, cake batter and muffin batter, I didn’t feel nervous about leaving it to work while I stood nearby.

At higher speeds, particularly speed six, it becomes louder and more intense. That’s not unusual for a stand mixer, but it’s worth noting if you’re sensitive to noise or tend to bake while children are asleep. I preferred speed four most of the time because it felt like the best balance of power and tolerable noise.

With pizza dough, the mixer had more work to do, as you’d expect. It handled the dough without making us feel concerned, though I’d still keep an eye on it with heavier mixtures. 

This is a compact mixer, not a hulking industrial beast, and I think it’s best used within that realistic family-cooking lane.

Quality, design and durability: does it feel built to last?

The Kenwood Go has an all-metal body, but it still feels light enough to move easily. That combination is important because a compact mixer needs to avoid feeling flimsy. This doesn’t. It feels practical, tidy and well thought through rather than flashy.

The built-in handle is the best design feature by far. It makes the whole thing feel more usable. A stand mixer that you can’t be bothered to lift is a stand mixer that slowly becomes an expensive ornament. This one is easy enough to move in and out of a cupboard, which means I actually use it.

The retractable cable is another small win. It sounds minor, but when you’re trying to keep a cupboard vaguely organised, not having a trailing plug lead wrapped around everything is helpful.

Aesthetically, I like the eucalyptus green. It feels more modern than some traditional stand mixer shades. That said, I do wonder if Kenwood would sell even more if there were a cream or softer neutral option. Not everyone wants red, blue or green in their kitchen.

Finally, as someone routinely distracted by laundry, children or the dogs barking at absolutely nothing, I also appreciate that it switches itself off after 20 minutes of inactivity. 

Is the Kenwood Go good value for money?

With an RRP of £250, the Kenwood Go sits in a sensible place for people who want a stand mixer without spending KitchenAid levels of money or surrendering their worktop. The value depends on how you’ll use it.

If you bake huge batches every weekend, want a large bowl and expect to knead heavy doughs regularly, this probably isn’t the one. You’ll want something bigger and more powerful.

But if you’re a beginner, a casual baker or a parent trying to make more snacks, cakes and doughs from scratch, it makes a lot of sense. 

The fact that it’s easy to store is part of the value. An appliance can have every feature under the sun, but if it’s too heavy or annoying to get out, it becomes cupboard guilt. The Kenwood Go avoids that.

It has also encouraged me to bake more, which is not something I expected to write. Not in a smug, sourdough-starter way. More in a “fine, I can make muffins and butter without having a small breakdown” way.

Compare stand mixers: Kenwood’s Go vs kMix vs Chef Baker

Who is the Kenwood Go stand mixer best for?

The Kenwood Go is best for people with small kitchens, limited storage and no desire to keep a huge mixer on display all year round. It’s also a great fit for beginner bakers who want help with the basics but don’t want to be overwhelmed by a machine that looks like it belongs on Bake Off.

It suits:

• Occasional bakers

• Beginner bakers

• Small kitchens

• Families making snacks from scratch

• People who want a mixer they can store away easily

• Anyone who finds traditional stand mixers too big or intimidating

It is less suited to:

• Large households making big batches

• Serious bread makers

• Very frequent bakers who need a larger bowl

• Anyone who wants lots of optional attachments

There are optional attachments available if you want to expand it later, but out of the box this feels straightforward.

It’s a lovely design - I just wish there was more colour options available 

Final verdict

The Kenwood Go Stand Mixer has done something I didn’t really expect: it has made baking feel manageable. Not glamorous or perfect, but manageable. For me, that’s much more useful.

It has helped me make homemade butter, cake batter, muffin batter and family pizza dough without feeling like I’ve taken on a second job. It’s compact enough to store in a cupboard, light enough to carry, simple enough for a beginner and capable enough for the recipes I actually make.

No, it isn’t the biggest stand mixer. No, speed six is not subtle. And yes, I’d like a cream colourway please, Kenwood. But for reluctant bakers, small kitchens and families who want to make more food from scratch without buying an enormous machine, it’s a very likeable little mixer.

Like a first car, I think I’ll always remember it. Mainly because it’s the one that turned me into someone who makes her own butter. Which is ridiculous, frankly, but here we are.

About the author

Rebecca Roberts (aka Beccy) is our resident lifestyle expert with a practical focus on sleep, wellness and everyday comfort. She’s equally at home tackling frank, NSFW‑adjacent topics as she is road‑testing kitchen appliances, mattresses and vacuums that work for real parents. As a mum of two, she writes with the time‑poor, sleep‑deprived in mind - honest product reviews, realistic routines and products that make parents’ lives easier.

When she’s not at her desk, she’s probably product‑testing with her two helpers, corralling a PTA or walking her two dogs up and down country lanes.

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