What is the difference between stirring and beating a mixture

However, if you're going to do so, be sure to wash up before. The opposite end of the spectrum would be an electric mixer, where you barely have to move a muscle. Electric mixers are useful for mixing large amounts of ingredients or when preparing multiple batches of a certain type of food. You can also beat some foods with electric mixers since most of them have a variety of speed settings. Mixing would use a slower speed, while beating is performed a lot faster.

Nutrition Cooking and Baking Baking Basics. Andra Picincu is a certified nutritionist and personal trainer with more than 10 years of experience. Her mission is to help people live healthier lives by making smarter food choices and staying active. In her daily life, Ms. Picincu provides digital marketing consulting and copywriting services as well as nutrition counseling. She owns ShapeYourEnergy, a popular health and fitness website.

In , she launched a local nutrition office and partnered up with local gyms to help their clients take the steps needed to better health. Picincu is a regular contributor to these platforms where she provides either health-related content or coaching to those who are interested in achieving a balanced lifestyle. Connect on LinkedIn. A recipe might call for you to stir an egg into a mixture but that's a different thing. Preparing an egg involves beating it.

Click to expand Hermione Golightly Senior Member London. Beating is not the same as stirring. Beating is a vigorous action while stirring is gently moving something in a circular way. We might beat sugar and butter together then beat in already beaten eggs, then gently stir in flour, if we're making a typical British cake. They are two different techniques with different results. Beating when you should be stirring could ruin the final result. The difference is rather like the difference between hitting and stroking.

Thank goodness! I remember making mayonnaise with a fork at an ill-equipped summer cottage while on vacation some years ago. It took a very, very long time. Beating butter or another fat until it becomes soft, smooth, and fluffy is called creaming.

This can be done with a spoon again, a wooden one is the right choice , a very stiff whisk, or an electric mixer. Creaming aerates the fat and contributes to the final lightness of the baked good. So in essence, creaming is beating butter or fat.

If you want to practice beating butter, try this Spiced Sugar Cookie recipe. It differs from beating in that aeration is not a goal. Blending can be done manually with a spoon, fork, whisk, scraper or spatula , or with an electric mixer, blender, or food processor.

Sometimes blending is most effectively done with your hands, for example, when blending a meatloaf mixture. Whipping is to beat rapidly with a wire whisk or electric mixer so as to incorporate air to lighten a mixture and increase its volume. Think egg whites or heavy cream. You can mix by hand, using a spoon, or by machine, using a mixing or beating attachment.

I'm sure there will be some overlap in these descriptions. Andygc Senior Member Devon. I checked with my cook. The essential difference between beating and whisking is that beating is intended to mix the ingredients thoroughly, while whisking is intended to incorporate air into whatever is being whisked. Andygc said:. Click to expand In the early stages of bread-making, for instance, or when making crumbles.