Start
A few years ago, I decided to find a set of kitchen appliances for making traditional Chinese food from flour with less labor. A friend of mine had a KitchenAid 6qt mixer. He used it for bread, steamed bread, and dumping dough. So this is my starting point. I take a different approach from a lot of people. Instead of settling on one piece of equipment and waiting for a sale, I make a list of things I want the appliances to do for me, i.e., investment objectives:
1) Making dumping wraps (not just dough, but finished wrap, i.e.,饺子皮)
2) Making noodles （面条）
3) Making dough for steamed bread （馒头）or pan-fried pies （烙饼）
4) Mixing stuffing
I break this list down to repeating operations:
1) Mixing ingredients
2) Kneading dough (for different uses)
3) Making pasta sheet from dough
4) Cutting dumping wraps from pasta sheet
5) Making pasta/noodle
From this list of operations, I started putting together a system of equipment to perform the operations.
Solution
Among all the operations, 4) is the easiest. Dumping wraps can be made from rolled pasta sheets using a circular cookie/biscuit cutter. I know I can also make my own cutters.
The hardest is operation 2). Kneading the dough is the most demanding operation to a unit. To my surprise, the KitchenAid mixers are not really made for this. They are primarily designed for pastry making, i.e., cakes and cookies. Serious bread makers use Bosch mixers, Verona mixer, or Hobart mixers. People reported some issues around using KitchenAid 5qt and 6qt mixers for kneading their dough. I thought about building my system around Bosch mixer. But Bosch mixer does not offer an attachment for making pasta sheet, which is necessary to make dumping wraps in my case. There are two ways to make pasta, extrusion and rolled. The pasta made from extrusion is twice as dense as rolled, and takes longer to cook and does not take the sauce as well. But certain pasta, like macaroni, can only be made using extrusion method. Bosch only offers the extrusion method on their mixer, while KitchenAid has attachments to do pasta both ways.
I take another look at KitchenAid products. KitchenAid offers a 7qt stand mixer with a DC motor. It is a quiet and powerful unit built to run continuously for a long time. This mixer is a new design from ground up, targeting chefs and pastry makers. It was first offered as NSF certified commercial version around 2009. Williams Sonoma carries their exclusive version with cosmetic differences.
Now I have a system, KitchenAid 7qt stand mixer with Pasta attachments. The mixer itself can do operations 1) with beater, and 2) with dough hook. The mixer with pasta sheet roller covers operation 3). From pasta sheet (6 inch wide), I can cut out round dumping wrap using cookie/biscuit cutters. That is operation 4). The pasta cutters give me different pasta (noodle), taking care of operation 5).
List of Appliances
KitchenAid RKSM7990WH 7qt stand mixer
Second mixing bowl KSMC7QBOWL (optional, one for dough and the other for stuffing)
KitchenAid Pasta Roller & Cutter Set (KPRA)
Cookie/biscuit Cutter (around 3.25” diameter, made mine from an almond can)
Experience
At first, I feel that the mixer is big for home kitchen. But I get over the feeling when I see the mixer performs. I tried all operations on the list. The system performed very well for me on everything I put it through. I can knead dough from 2 cups to 16 cups (0.5 lb to 4.5 lb) of flour. When I do steamed bread, the large capacity gives the space for the dough to rise in the bowl. I can put the bowl back on the mixer for the second round of kneading. The mixer is quiet. The attachments are well made, but require some fine tune. Overall, I am pleased with every piece I selected in the system.
Cooking Chinese food from flour is easier, and the results are better. Is it worth the investment? To me, the answer is definitely “Yes”. I wish I have done it years ago.