The Fresh Loaf

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Bosch Compact

April 29, 2010 - 5:46pm
plevee's picture
plevee

Bosch Compact

I bought a Bosch Compact on eBay. It is great for bread - kneaded a 5 1/2# batch of Hamelman's 5 grain rye sourdough with absolutely no problem - but I cannot get it to cream butter and sugar for making cakes. I have the manual but there is no advice which attachment to use & neither the multiwired nor the few wired attachments seems to do a good job. Does any cake maker use the baby Bosch?

BTW I have a DLX 9000, also bought on eBay, which someone stronger & taller than me might be interested in buying (I have to stand on tiptoe to look in the bowl on my counter). It is in excellent condition & comes with the roller & dough hook, not the smaller bowl & whisk. I paid $277 & would sell it for the same plus shipping. Patsy

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LindyD's picture
LindyD
Apr 29 2010 - 7:28pm

Hi Patsy,

Isn't the compact a terrific little workhorse?  I recently purchased one but haven't used it for anything it but bagel and bread dough, at which it excels.  

I checked around the Internet and found the following info at the GardenWeb site:

It doesn't have a "K beater" like a Kitchenaid (or the Hamilton Beach even), & I worried that the mixer attachments wouldn't be up to snuff. But I think I prefer the Compact's wire beater to a "K" beater anyway. The wire beater cuts shortening or butter into flour nicely for pie crusts & biscuits. The variable speeds allow for a light touch that pastry & biscuits require, and the wire beater is great for this. The wire beater works just fine for creaming soft butter & for making sugar-cookie-consistency cookie doughs. For creaming very cold butter & for stiffer doughs like oatmeal raisin cookies (& of course for kneaded bread doughs), the dough hook works well. The whisk makes fluffy egg whites & whipped cream, but all mixers excel at this :)

Perhaps try creaming cold butter and sugar with the dough hook.  A review at Cook's Illustrated also noted one of their tests involved creaming butter and sugar, and it did a good job.  

plevee's picture
plevee
Apr 29 2010 - 8:37pm

Thanks Lindy, I've tried everything else, but didn't think of the dough hook.

It is an amazing little machine for bread doughs and takes up much less space than other machines I've tried. I hope I can get it to work for cakes, then I can clear away some of my clutter.  Patsy

alabubba's picture
alabubba
Apr 29 2010 - 9:08pm

The heavy wire beater should make short work of your butter and sugar mixture. Start them slow and kick up the speed after it starts to come together. I have an OLD worn out (1st gen) compact and it is a workhorse. I have make everything from bread to mayo in mine. Whips the crap out of egg whites too.

Triple batches of cookies are a little too much for them.

I baked 50+ dozen cookies and 11 fruitcakes for x-mas and it didn't miss a beat.

Alas, I think the motor in mine is worn out as it will no longer knead any thick bread dough. It still makes wonderful whip cream though.

 

LindyD's picture
LindyD
May 2 2010 - 5:55pm

Hi again, Nancy58.

No idea about the Bosch Universal.  The OP on this thread is a Bosch Compact owner who had questioned the best way to cream butter with the Compact.

I do recall that some of the Universal owners had posted in other threads that it's best to use the roller when mixing dough.  Maybe if you put "Bosch Universal" in the TFL search bar, you'll find something that will help you out.

Hope you find the answer.