• The art of mixing. If nowadays the mixer continues to carry out, with discretion, its mission as a faithful soldier of the masters in laboratories and kitchens, the evolution in time and space of this instrument starts from its ancestors, the wooden whisks, which date back to the Bronze Age
Just like a sorcerer or alchemist, the cook, to perform his own magic, is dependent on three basic elements: water, air and fire. The union and homogenization of the ingredients, by mixing them, requires the rapid introduction of an external element - air. It causes deep changes in the structure of the composition, through the consecutive mixing of the ingredients. Carefully analyzed, this simple gesture - mixing - actually translates into a complex action.
By mixing some basic products, complex and well-defined dishes are obtained both in terms of structure and taste. It seems easy to make an egg white foam. However, it often happens that the egg white is mixed too little, and the end result is an insufficient increase in volume or even an anticipated and unwanted loss of volume. Therefore, various tests carried out reveal the fact that it is necessary to mix the egg white until the foam obtained will form certain internal networks that will connect with each other.
Mixing some ingredients depends on many factors. Thus, to the variety of the structure of the ingredients are added the traditions passed down from generation to generation, the specific working methods and improved over time, complemented by the imagination, craftsmanship and originality of the preparer.
Mixing the ingredients with art requires experience or talent
Throughout culinary history, even without the use of yeasts or leavening agents, man has managed to "capture" the air from the environment and incorporate it into the ingredients used, so that his dishes or specialties are lighter, fluffier , better amalgamated and bound. This is how Giuseppe Ferrari explains in his book "Circles of Air. The art of mixing", the technique by which, with the help of increasingly elaborate utensils over the centuries, people have created chocolate foam, mayonnaise, whipped cream, mousses, fine creams or other types of products.
"A utensil is not just an extension of man's hand, but rather his connection to the universe, the object that ensures his communion with it, always and forever, to the point where they become a unitary whole that can hold the whole world between the fingers of a hands". It is the metaphor attributed by the Italian writer and archaeologist, Giuseppe Ferrari, to a tool that has accompanied man in his long adventure to discover new tastes and textures, a utensil that has experienced spectacular transformations, depending on the changing times and the wonderful inventions of human minds.
Nowadays, thanks to the return to traditional values, we are rediscovering with amazement ancient procedures, which give a completely different value to actions that we used to consider trivial. This art, which has reinvented culinary tastes and textures over the centuries, is the art of mixing.
The first goals for mixing
Traversing the mists of history, the appearance of these working tools dates back to the Bronze Age, and their evolution starts from its ancestors, the wooden tools, according to the discoveries in the Alpine arc.
Traveling further in time and space, the shadow of other strange and curious objects looms, which were known to have the ability to "capture" the air. These represented the artisan telluris, typically made of white wood or hardwood. 
In his Spanish-Nahuatl (the language of the Aztecs) dictionary, published in 1571, Alonso de Molina defines, probably for the first time, "the utensil used to mix cocoa when making hot chocolate" as a utensil resembling an iron hook. The French write with interest about these utensils, ancestors of the tel, for preparing the chocolate drink, and they do not hide that these "sticks" come from Central America and belong to the pre-Columbian civilization. Explainable, if we consider that the story of the drink obtained from cocoa powder also begins there. The magical cocoa liquor turned into chocolate only after it reached the court of the King of Spain in the middle of the 1615th century. Only in XNUMX, with the marriage of Princess Anne of Austria (daughter of King Philip III of Spain) to King Louis XIII, the delicious drink called "chocolate" reached the royal court of France.
In his book, "New Travels in the Lands of the French Indies in America", from 1772, the French missionary priest, Jean Baptiste Labat, describes this mysterious object as follows: "a stick about 10 fingers taller than a chocolate bar in order to be rolled (twisted) freely between the palms".
Until the 1800s and early 1900s in France, this utensil was called moussoir or reel, and was used to "melt" cocoa powder in water or milk. Moreover, by using this tool, the hot chocolate acquires a foamy structure.
The simpler or more elaborate construction of these wooden handicrafts was based on a unitary technique. All had the terminal part, the one that came into contact, that activated the chemical process and led to the physical transformations of the product, worked in a special way and, at the same time, diversified from one area to another. Regardless of shape and complexity, they all had the termination formed by protruding parts, often also provided with various grooves.
But, then as now, the final result depended and was checked on this point: the relationship between the walls of the vessel and the shape of the terminal part of the wire used. Thus, it can be observed, since those times, the concern for achieving an optimal relationship between the shapes of the utensils used.
Ancient mixing techniques
It is assumed that, in the beginning, to get the foam on top of the hot chocolate, the liquid was poured from one bowl to another, from different heights. Only later did the goal or beater appear. The Creole Spaniards used the molinillo, a vertical stick, which was twisted between the palms to obtain the chocolate foam. The manual technique called "milling" was to continuously twist the wire back and forth, but also to "beat" and mix at the same time until the foam was created. When, following the Spanish colonization, vessels loaded with these utensils made of Mexican wood and intended for the preparation of a delicious hot chocolate arrived in Europe, not only new flavors appeared, but also a new food culture.
Three elements inseparable heralded the birth of the mixer
"Mousse" means foam in French. This is why the French called the "melt" from Spain and used in the production of chocolate foam, "moussoire". The utensil was used by confectioners at the royal court, but also by servants in French homes to obtain the delicious foam when cocoa was dissolved in water or milk. Basically, I write the recipes of the time, the chocolate drink was mixed with the moussoire until a layer of foam formed on the surface of the mixture. The preparation was then served in a closed chocolate box with a lid. Anna of Austria nicknamed one of her maids Molina, because the woman mastered the milling technique like no other, as mixing was called in Spain. Thus, for the first time in the history of chocolate preparations, in the XNUMXth century, the chocolate maker, the vessel in which the foam was prepared, the hot cocoa drink and the moussoire or whisk with which the foam was prepared, became three inseparable elements.
The first mechanical "mixer" for eggs
The whisk, in all its variants, used to mix milk, various mixtures, foams and creams or to beat butter and cream, remained, literally and figuratively, almost two centuries in the hands of chefs or confectioners.
The mixing technique took a huge step forward only in the middle of the XNUMXth century, when the mechanical "mixer" for eggs was invented. 
It was operated manually and benefited from a system of two goals whose movement was provided by a gear wheel. The inventor of this "mixer" is considered to be Ralph Collier, of Baltimore, Maryland, who patented his invention in 1856. Collier's invention had applications in several utensils or mechanisms still used today, such as drills or automobile transmissions. Almost at the same time, a rotary mechanical mixer was also patented in England, under the signature of EP Griffith. Griffith's version of 1857 differed from Collier's. The mechanism with rotating targets, operated by an external handle, was fixed inside a vessel. Just two years later, in 1859, JF and EP Monroe of the US patented another type of mixer. This was one of the first patents bought by the Dover Stamping company, and the mixers produced by it later established the American brand. Dover mixers could also be used for mixing paints or other types of compositions. If, in the early 1870s, a Dover egg beater cost $1,50, in 1880 they could afford to sell it for $1,25. Over time through the increase in the number of awarded patents, the price of mixers has decreased, making it a more affordable product.
A baker's toil inspired the electric bowl mixer
Rufus W. Eastman is the name of the inventor who patented the first electric mixer, in 1885. In a short time, new models of mixers appeared, among them the invention of psychologist Lillian Gilbreth, mother of 12 children. In 1908, engineer Herbert Johnson was impressed by the toil of a baker kneading bread dough with a metal spoon. That's when he got the idea to create a stand mixer with a bowl, which quickly became known as the appliance that provides the greatest help in the kitchen, hence the name that became the brand, KitchenAid. The H mixer was unique due to the concept of "planetary action", whereby the mixer rotates the container in one direction, while the whisk rotates in the opposite direction. In 1911, LH Hamilton, Chester Beach and Fred Osirus patented a new model of electric mixer – an apparatus consisting of a porcelain platform with a single metal paddle, which was operated by an engine. The device was equipped with a button that, once pressed, would start the motor and thus the metal paddle would start to rotate. From the beginning, electric mixers ranged from smaller, single-blade models to complex, two-blade models with an included bowl.
The mixer dance
" Inert elements, milk, cocoa, spices... united and then made to interact, through the dance of the mixer.
The liquid is channeled, then overflows, subsides slightly and rolls over and under the rotating obstacle. It is a colorful, lively, frothy movement that meets the ingredients added along the way, creating new colors and flavors. The wire turns into a magic wand, turning the kitchen into an alchemy lab. And when the palms imprint the rotation movement, the handle comes to life and simply becomes an extension of the hand. This image transports us back in time, in the light of primitive fires, entering a parallel reality, where we can feel the striking aromas spread by the ancient hot chocolate foam, where the lid of the chocolate maker hid the result but promised unexpected revelations.
Milk combined with eggs and cocoa, sugar and melted dark chocolate added to the cream, a pinch of chili, vanilla, butter and raisins... the mixer's handle values such embraces, approves and favors them, raising these unions to new levels of enjoyment.
Spirals or loops carved in wood, profiled moldings on its terminations, the star-shaped end or with aluminum rods crossed and arranged symmetrically in fanciful repetitions that promise excellent fusions, this is the power of its geometric play". (Giuseppe Ferrari – Circles of Air. The Art of Mixing)
