Owning a KitchenAid stand mixer is considered by many to be one of the defining requirements of an “official” home kitchen. The quality, usefulness, and durability of KitchenAid’s stand mixers are among the best in the industry, and although the price of admission to the KitchenAid owner’s club can be a bit intimidating, it is universally regarded as being well worth the investment.
Once you have purchased your mixer, the next step is deciding which attachments you are going to buy to expand its functionality. The KitchenAid Stand Mixer is one of the most versatile pieces of equipment that you can buy for your kitchen, and while its prowess in the mixing and baking department is taken for granted at this point, the often overlooked attachment hub on the front of the mixer offers the potential to turn your KitchenAid into a truly everyday appliance. However, KitchenAid’s renowned level of quality does come at a bit of a price, and with the number of different accessories and attachments available for your mixer numbering easily into the tens, those on a more limited budget are going to have to be more selective about their accessories line up. But by tailoring your accessory selection to your most common cooking and baking tasks, the upfront investment will undoubtedly prove to be well worth it in the long run. Here are a few ways to outfit your KitchenAid Stand Mixer to best suit your most frequent needs.
Mixing and Baking:
Your KitchenAid mixer already comes equipped with a few basic baking attachments: typically a wire whip, beater, dough hook, and standard mixing bowl are included with most residential models. While these tools are all that you need to get started, those who intend to do a lot of baking prep with their mixer may want to consider upgrading a few of their components.
- Wire Whip Attachment: Increases the whisking capacity of your mixer significantly. The additional wires on the whip allow for maximum air incorporation and speeds up the mixing time.
- Coated Flat Beater Attachment: Coated flat beater specifically designed to mix ingredients in every part of your bowl. Improves the scraping performance of your mixer, ensuring that as few ingredients as possible are left clinging to the side of the mixing bowl and speeding up the ingredient incorporation process. Ideal for whipping up quick breads, cake batter, cookie dough, or mashed potatoes!
- Slicer/Shredder/Grinder Attachment: Turn your Kitchen Aid stand mixer into a versatile appliance with this attachment pack. Easily slice and shred fruits, vegetables, nuts, and cheese. You can even grind season meats, and strain fruits and vegetables for sauces. Pack includes: food grinder, rotor slicer, and fruit and vegetable strainer. Attaches to standard mixing bowl.
- Food Tray Attachment: This food tray attachment is a convenient way to hold food while using your KitchenAid stand mixer. It also works great to maintain even flow when used with the food grinder attachment.
- Ice Cream Maker Attachment: The KitchenAid ice cream maker attachment turns your stand mixer into a quick and easy to use ice cream maker. This attachment is made up of two parts: the freeze bowl and dasher mixer attachment (each sold separately). To use the ice cream maker, simply chill the freeze bowl in the freezer for a minimum of 15 hours and prepare your ice cream batter. Once the freeze bowl is properly chilled, assemble and engage the freeze bowl, dasher, and drive assembly, add your batter, and watch as your KitchenAid stand mixer mixes up the perfect batch of homemade ice cream or sorbet. Solid ingredients can be added to the batter to be mixed in once the ice cream begins to solidify.
Food Processing:
KitchenAid offers a number of food processing and meat grinding accessories to be used with the hub attachment located on the front of the mixer. Simply remove the KitchenAid logo cover, plug in your accessory of choice, and your KitchenAid is now a full-fledged food slicer, chopper, or grinder.
- Food Grinder Attachment: The KitchenAid Food Grinder is the perfect way to grind meats, firm fruits, vegetables, dry breads, and even cheese. Simply attach the grinder to the front of your KitchenAid and feed the food in from the food tray above the grinding mechanism. Comes with course and fine grinder plates for a wide variety of applications, as well as a plastic stomper to push food into the grinding tube. With the addition of the KitchenAid’s sausage stuffer kit, the food grinder attachment effortlessly becomes a sausage stuffing mechanism for your ground meats (or vegetarian substitute).
- Roto Slicer: KitchenAid’s Roto Slicer attachment makes quick work of slicing up your fruits, vegetables, or cheeses. Simply feed your produce into the top of the slicer, and the rotating slicer cone will take care of the rest. Sliced ingredients fall from the front of the attachment, and the open, front-facing design makes it easy to retrieve stubborn or trapped pieces. Includes 2 slicer cones for thick or thin slices, as well as 2 shredder cones for course or fine shreds.
- Fruit & Vegetable Strainer & Grinder: This attachment comes complete with the KitchenAid food grinder attachment, but the fruit and vegetable strainer addition can be bought separately if you already own the grinder. In conjunction with the grinder, the fruit and vegetable strainer attachment enables your KitchenAid stand mixer to quickly and easily puree and strain fruits and vegetables. Food is fed into the grinder in the fashion explained above, where it is ground and mashed by the strainer cover. The juice from your fruits and vegetables drains from the back of the strainer’s specialized grinder cover, while the pureed fruit mass is ejected from the front of the attachment to be discarded or collected for another use. This attachment should be used only with soft or cooked foods.
- Sausage Stuffer Attachment: The all sausage stuffer attachment grinds up meats and allows you to prepare delicious bratwurst, kielbasa, Polish and Italian sausage for your entire family in your own home!
- Citrus Juicer Attachment: The KitchenAid citrus juicer attachment makes quick work of juicing your citrus fruits. Simply attach the juicer to the attachment hub of your stand mixer, cut your citrus fruits in half, and let the spinning reamer do the squeezing for you. Includes a removable strainer to help trap any unwanted pulp.
Pasta:
In addition to tools for preparing fruits and vegetables, KitchenAid also offers a collection of pasta preparation attachments that will have you creating scratch-made pasta dishes in no time.
- Pasta Roller Attachment: This attachment allows you to easily roll homemade pasta dough into sheets for delicious scratch-made lasagna or fettuccini noodles. The roller creates 6" wide sheets of dough and features 9 settings that allow you to adjust the thickness of the dough. Comes with a cleaning brush for easy cleaning.
- Pasta Cutter Attachment: These pasta cutter attachments are specifically designed to cuts sheets of dough from the KitchenAid pasta roller and quickly cut them into individual noodles. The pasta cutter is available with a variety of blade arrangements for creating different types of noodles, and comes with a cleaning brush for easy cleaning. When paired with the KitchenAid pasta roller attachment, these pasta cutters take the guesswork and tedium out of creating fresh, handmade noodles for your pasta recipes.
