Sturdy and bulky machine to last a lifetime. (Kenwood Chef Foodmixer)

Member Name: thegrid

Product:	Kenwood Chef Foodmixer
Date:	19/08/06 (2307 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Designed to last a lifetime. Many attachments and parts available for new and old machines.

Disadvantages: Designed for huge hands. Attachments designed to be incompatible with older models & household items

In Holland it is not easy to find a shop that sells new Kenwood kitchenmachines. I had to buy secondhand. An old Kenwood 901 with some attachments and an old Kenwood 701 with some other attachments. The machines are incompatible so I need to use the one for meatmincing and the other for vegetable slicing, etc. The number of new and secondhand available attachments is huge and the spareparts are available as well. Even for very old machines. That is why this sturdy machine will allways outlive other brands machines.

Most attachments are made out of cast aluminum and plastic. The material will turn darkgrey when washed and used a lot, so paint is used to cover it. The choosen paint cannot withstand many years of use and cleaning either, so at some point in time scufs of paint will come off. You do not want that in your food, so you have to peel off all paint and end up with a darkgrey aluminum item anyway. Allways wash the aluminum oxide from the item and your hands, so your food does not get black and contaminated with aluminum oxide particles. The machine itself is also made out of cast aluminum and the chips of paint will come off after some years. This does not harm the functionality in any way, it just does not look so good.

The rubber feet will need to be replaced soon and they leave marks on an aluminum workspace. You can make new feet yourself, using a heated gluepistol or a silicon kit pistol. Just take out the original feet, fill the feetholes with the kit or glue and build it up untill you have feet the height you want.

Some attachments are disappointingly incompatible.

The front attachments for model 701 do not fit the 901, but the new designed front was no improvement. Same goes for the blender attachment of these models. It looks like the design goal at the time was incompatibility.

On the Multimill attachment glass jars are used where you normally would put a blender goblet. Good thinking. But no normal household jam jar will fit the attachment. You have to buy expensive Kenwood jars. Another design with incompatibility in mind.

For the newer models there are 2 different pasta mills, 2 meatmincers, and a kebbeh mill. They are all basically the same, but designed with incompatible parts, so you have to buy them all if you want all the functions. And they don´t come cheap.

I often wonder if English woman have large hands. Or maybe Kenwood designers simply designed without thinking of the user. All parts are to large for my hands. Often I have to use both hands for what I should have been able to do with 1 hand to have the other one free for a simultanious task. It is not the most ergonomic design.

You will only buy the Kenwood kitchenmachine if you intend to buy a lot of attachments too. No designer at Kenwood has thought of the space it takes to stow all these attachments away. No parts with double purpose. No parts that neatly fit in aech other for storage. The machine and the attachments look like a first model of a product that has to be worked over by a real designer to become a real product.

Improved design would save the user money, space, time and painfull hands.

Some attachments are so badly designed, I do fear to use them.
One of those is the citrus juicer for model 901 or is it only for the 701? I tried to use it once and it got stuck, burned a model 901 motor, was put away to be never used again. Almost any brand of kitchen machines has designed something better for this purpose.

Why do I still prefer this machine above all other available kitchen machines? Apart from the choosen paint and rubber, incompatibility with human hands and other Kenwood models and parts, the attachments and the machines themselves are designed to last a lifetime. The old Kenwood machines have outlived many better looking and feeling modern kitchen machines that I have had over the years. I allways had to fall back on the Kenwoods, after a nice and much newer machine had died again.

Now that it is so much easier to find second hand machines, parts and attachments on the internet, I bought a "new" model that is only 16 years old and the attachments that go with it.
At last I do no longer have to keep 2 different models, for I have found allmost all attachments that fit my latest Kenwood.
All I have to miss from now, is the peahuller. That one has not been designed to fit machines younger then 30 years of age.

If you have the seller and the money available, it is best to buy a new machine. Should you not find all attachments you want in the shop, look for secondhand attachments. Kenwood has made many more attachments than you will ever find new in any kitchen appliances shop.

With all its downsides, this is the only kitchenmachine to consider.
Whatever the database of dooyoo makes of my judgement, I do recommend this kitchenmachine!
(I clicked Recommend Yes. But that does not show below.)

No other brand can match the range of attachments, the availability of spareparts and the lifetime of this machine.

Summary: Not perfect, but with all its downsides, this is the only kitchenmachine to consider.