"Dave Smith" > wrote in message
...
> On 2016-03-20 4:00 PM, jinx the minx wrote:
>> jmcquown > wrote:
>>> On 3/20/2016 2:33 PM, notbob wrote:
>>>> Do I gotta drag out my orbital stand mixer or is there a manual way to
>>>> cream butter/sugar?
>>>>
>>>> IOW, how did chefs cream butter into sugar b4 electricity?
>>>>
>>>> nb
>>>>
>>> Softened butter and the back of a spoon.
>>>
>>> Jill
>>>
>>
>> I've never used anything electric to cream butter and sugar. Usually I
>> use a spoon, sometimes a fork or my pastry cutter, and occasionally my
>> bare
>> hands.
>>
>
>
> I have to admit that I have no idea why you would do that, other than to
> prepare to live through the Apocalypse. I have done it by hand and it is a
> lot of work. I have used recipes that said to use a spoon but cheated and
> used beaters, and I had great results. I used to bake a lot of cookies and
> always used the electric beater and they did a great job. Creaming the
> butter and sugar is a very important step in making good cookies.

As one who used to make tons of cookies, I would disagree there. Not sure
how I decided to use my hands but I did. Yes, it will melt the butter or
margarine or whatever. But you just put it back in the fridge to firm up.
And I suppose that it might depend on what kind of cookies you are making.
But I've done sugar cookies, peanut butter, oatmeal, chocolate chip, spritz,
shortbread and many others all mixed with only my hands. I didn't even
follow the steps. Just dump and mix. Always came out. I've seen TV chefs
say that hands are the best for mixing cookies too. You quickly get a feel
for the dough and whether or not you have enough flour in there.