Proctor-Silex Mixer: On the Virtues of the Bowl Rest

The Proctor-Silex 5-speed Easy Mix mixer is a fairly standard low-end hand-held mixer with a couple of quirks worth knowing about ahead of time.

General description

As with most hand-held mixers, the beaters eject easily and can be washed by hand or in the dishwasher.

The mixer has 5 speeds but I have never needed to go beyond the third speed. The mixer performs well on speeds 1 through 3—no shaking, smells, or other problems are evident, suggesting that the motor is of good quality.

I use the mixer infrequently—usually about once or twice a month. I’ve had the mixer about half a year using it at that rate, so I can’t as of yet speak to its long-term performance, nor its performance under heavy use. It’s also worth noting that I use it for relatively easy mixing jobs—cake and cookie batter or blending soft cheeses. The mixer has performed well on these tasks in general (but see below), but I can’t speak to how it would work on more dense foods.

The big benefit: the Bowl Rest

I didn’t shop around much for this mixer, basically just choosing the cheapest one I could find. I am quite glad that I ended up with this Proctor-Silex, though, because it has a really nice feature I haven’t encountered elsewhere: the Bowl Rest. The Bowl Rest is what it sounds like: an indentation at the rear of the mixer’s body allows you to rest the mixer on the bowl’s edge while cooking. You can’t do this while the mixer is running, but it is very convenient to set down the mixer while checking a recipe, scraping the sides of the bowl, or adding an ingredient. Any cook who has tried to balance another kind of mixer and had the mixer flop onto the counter, splattering batter on the counter and/or wall, will appreciate this feature. It only works on large-sized, sturdy bowls (the directions say to use it only on bowls larger than 1-1/2 quarts), but it is still a wonderful feature.

One con: beater size

The one (minor) problem I have encountered with this mixer has to do with the size of the beaters. The actual part that does the beating (in other words, not the stem that connects beater to mixer base, just the beater itself) is a bit shorter than other mixers I have used. This means that when mixing stiff batters that tend to build up inside the beater, the beater fills up more quickly than usual. This can be a bit annoying, but making small alterations (like making sure that butter is well-softened before trying to mix it) has solved the problem adequately for me. Cooks who tend to work on stiffer batters often, however, may find this annoyance more frustrating than I have.

Conclusions

I strongly recommend the Proctor-Silex 5-Speed Easy Mix mixer for cooks looking for a cheap, moderate-use hand-held mixer. Its Bowl Rest feature is really nice, and its small beater size can be dealt with adequately in most cases.