Mixers - is it worth spending more?

[Desert76]

I’ve decided to buy a hand mixer for baking, as I won some John Lewis vouchers.

I’ve never used one before, I usually just beat or whisk things by hand, but it takes ages.

I’d be using it for things like cakes, pancake batter, Yorkshire pudding, meringues. Probably I’d use it once a week or so.

There seems to be quite a price difference -£22 for the cheapest, £70 or so for a Dualit one, £108 for a Kitchen aid hand mixer.

Is the Kitchen aid one really 5 times better than the other one (think it is Bosch)? If it will last 5x longer, that would be worth it to me, but not sure if I need it to be 5 times more powerful. Or do I?

I know, buy cheap buy twice, but I don’t want to pay over the odds just for styling.

For what you would be using it for the £22 one, Kenwood? Is absolutely fine.
I have an all singing food processor with beater / whisk attachments but I still use my cheap hand mixer for basic cakes.

No recent experience with buying handwhisks, but with some super cheap ones I’ve used at friends houses, the motor has struggled with buttercream. Might be worth comparing the technical specs between models (motor power in particular). At least it would be a bit of a pointer to see if what you are paying extra for is worthwhile.

You want the basic £20 Kenwood hand mixer. My mum upgraded last time she bought one, I can't remember what brand it was but she never liked it and was basically willing it to break. I've got a very expensive Kenwood chef but I still use my very cheap Kenwood hand mixer weekly.

Thanks, the £22 one is Kenwood! I’ll maybe just get that then.

DH has pointed out that if I buy that one, I can spend the rest of the vouchers in Waitrose buying lovely cake ingredients.

I wouldn’t go that cheap...live got a kenwood chefette...got it for about 60quid ....I just love it

I went through quite a few cheap ones making cream cheese frosting, upgraded to kitchen aid hand held, it’s amazing and I love it.

The supermarket and discount hand mixers I've bought over the years were basically disposable. Icing sugar gums up the works, and they struggled with buttercream at anything other than soft as cream.

Every mixer I've had with a lesser spec than the Kenwood is useless. Don't waste your time.

The KitchenAid is amazing but only if you're depending on it all the time for heavy duty mixing. It was a pleasure to use. Also, it's beautifully balanced as a gadget.

Get the KA if you want to use it all the while. Otherwise, look at something between cheap and Kenwood.

I never even use my hand mixer for butter cream, I just use a spoon.
The hand mixer has no problem creaming the butter & sugar for my cake so I’m thinking, if you find a hand mixer struggling with your butter, then maybe it hasn’t been left to soften for long enough.