First Post - The story of the stand mixer

This is my my first post on my first blog - inspired by my first stand mixer. I thought I would start from the beginning with a bit of a story on how this came about...

My husband and I are very recently married. The wedding was on July 16, 2011. After making our gift registry for the event, we laughed nervously at the overwhelming number of kitchen gadgets we had put on the list. We don't have a very big kitchen! How are we going to fit all of these new and exciting gadgets in?

In the department store, with that magical registry scanner in hand, I stood gawking at the beautiful cherry red KitchenAid Artisan Stand Mixer. Was this just a suped up hand mixer? Would it be the culprit of the next 10 pounds on my hips? Would I really find much use for it? That stand mixer spent 3 months on my registry list. A week before the wedding I got cold feet (about the mixer that is) and removed it. 'It will take up too much space', I thought, 'what I can do with that, I can do with a hand mixer', I boasted. Lo and behold, that fancy red mixer made its way into my very full kitchen.

Never being one to turn down the opportunity to learn something new I am now determined to test this mixer in broadening my culinary skills. I love cooking and baking but I must admit I am a bit of an amateur. It seems every recipe I have tried comes out between good and fabulous but these are not without their hiccups in between. Learning to bake and cook means experimenting and learning from every recipe. It means transferring skills picked up from BBQ'ing dinner to baking a pie. My goal with this blog is to share what I learn in the Adventures with Artisan - my stand mixer.

My goals:

• share pointers I have learned though direct trial and error with a range of recipes
• share recipes for others to savour themselves
• I am still critical of this mixer - Is it really the Porsche Speedster of the kitchen? I will be a critic of the gadget - is it worth the investment? to what extent can it be used? 

'Till next time, 

"The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you've got to have a what-the-hell attitude." - Julia Child  

L.