The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Mixer Knife vs dough hook

Headly's picture
Headly

Mixer Knife vs dough hook

I am looking at a vertical dough mixer for bagel operation (40qt).  It is a great mixer and has two attachments 1) a knife designed to be used for things like cheese...fine grate like, this is like a propeller or similar to food processor and sharp 2) another attachment which also looks like a propeller but is not sharp designed for dough, all examples they have for #2 are related to Pizza dough.

Although I am looking at a used one I did speak to the sales rep for the mfg.  He mentioned it works well for heavy dough like bagels and in fact rattled off a few larger chains that apparently use this mixer.  Sales rep goes on to say that "some" of the customers mix with cold / iced water --  this I understand related to the dough heating up; however, his second comment is again "some" of the bagel shops using this mixer choose to mix the dough with the knife attachment and not the one designed for dough.  I ask for an explanation about why this would be but he pulled the "I can't say due to confidentiality" card.

Any idea how the knife vs normal attachment would impact the resulting dough...if I do pull the trigger on this mixer I will test this but wondering what thoughts others have.

Thanks

 

 

MichaelLily's picture
MichaelLily

Charles Van Over developed a method for mixing dough with a food processor. The sharp blades disperse water through the flour (hydrate the dough) much faster than a mixer can. This drastically shortens both mixing time and bulk fermentation time, since the dough reaches full gluten development much quicker (due to fast hydration). The drawback is a much more uniform crumb. This, however, is not a drawback at all for bagels.

A blunter paddle, by contrast, would not hydrate the flour as quickly as blades and the mixing time, bulk fermentation time, and crumb uniformity would be closer to the results of using a standard mixer than the blades.

Headly's picture
Headly

Thanks