Beaters for electric mixers

[oldcook]

When I was young, electric mixers had only one shape of beater. The blades were flattish with a groove running vertically down them and sharpish edges. My new mixer has 2 beaters like that plus a single whisk beater and a set of two beaters that look like bent wires. The metal is much thicker than actual wire and is very strong.

I know when I want to use the whisk, but I have no idea which of the two sets of beaters I should use for other specific kinds of foods. When should I use the wire-looking beaters and when should I use the old-fashioned flatter beaters? Does it even matter?

OldCook

 

[Cooking4to]

wire would be for "whisking" like take a heavy cream and whisk it until its whipped cream, the flat bar beaters are for almost everything else, like mixing cake mixes, seasonings in ground pork, etc... {if they are what I picture in my head a picture would confirm it...}

 

[oldcook]

I wish I could send a picture, but I don't have a camera that I can use to upload photos, and when I use the windows snipping tool to copy an image and paste it into paint, the resulting image is so tiny it's almost not viewable. I can paste the images into a word doc, but this website doesn't accept those. I've tried everything I can think of to no avail. I do have a wire whisk with my beater set. The "wire" in the beaters I'm curious about are much sturdier than the whisk; probably equivalent to a strong clothes hanger, so I don't think it's supposed to be a whisk.

 

[RPCookin]

I wish I could send a picture, but I don't have a camera that I can use to upload photos, and when I use the windows snipping tool to copy an image and paste it into paint, the resulting image is so tiny it's almost not viewable. I can paste the images into a word doc, but this website doesn't accept those. I've tried everything I can think of to no avail. I do have a wire whisk with my beater set. The "wire" in the beaters I'm curious about are much sturdier than the whisk; probably equivalent to a strong clothes hanger, so I don't think it's supposed to be a whisk.

I know exactly what you are talking about. All American mixers used to come with the flat bladed beaters. My mom had a couple of Sunbeam mixers over the years, and both were the same. Also the first couple of mixers I owned had the same. I don't know if it's a European thing or what, but suddenly they changed, and every small mixer I've had in the last 15 years has had the the round blades, like heavy wires. Still 4 blades on each beater, but not flat metal. I liked the flat ones better for things like whipped potatoes, because they seemed to cut through the lumps better. I don't always mind a few lumps, but when serving certain guests, I want them smooth.

The hand mixer I have now has the round bladed beaters, a whisk, and what I can only figure are some sort of spiral dough hooks, although I've never used them because I have a KA bowl lift mixer when I need that. Lately I've gone more and more to the old fashioned method for dough... wooden spoon for mixing, and then hand kneading. There is something primal about making bread from scratch by hand.

 

[bakechef]

I know the beaters that you are talking about. The ones like bent wires and the flatter ones can be used interchangeably, they serve basically the same purpose. The bent wire ones might be slightly better for mixing thick cookie doughs and such.

Here are the wire ones that I believe that you are talking about sometimes referred to as "Euro style" beaters

These are likely the flatter ones

The single whisk makes efficient work of whipping cream and egg whites.