With good looks and more power than most KitchenAid models meant for home use, is Smeg's stand mixer the better buy?
Like KitchenAid, Smeg has its fair share of fanatics. From refrigerators to handheld blenders and everything in between, Italian brand Smeg offers upmarket versions of kitchen essentials that lean into midcentury modern style to a degree that’s hard to call anything but retro. If you dream of a technicolor, TV-inspired kitchen, Smeg delivers in spades: rounded silhouettes, bold color palettes with glossy enamel finishes and iconic chrome features.
But is Smeg all style and no substance when it comes to stand mixers? The brand hasn’t always impressed CNET writers across appliance categories, despite a general agreement that Smeg products always look good. As a long-time acolyte of KitchenAid’s stand mixers myself, but as someone who not-so-secretly yearns for a fully retro kitchen, I was keen to try Smeg’s new next-generation stand mixer, Forte. So how does this va-va-voom counter accessory stack up against what KitchenAid offers on more utilitarian matters?
Smeg’s new Forte model promises something none of the KitchenAid Artisan models do: 700 watts of motor power for all your mixing, whisking or kneading needs. So my evaluation centered on that.
First things first, though. At first glance, the Smeg Forte offers much of what I’d expect as a longtime KitchenAid user, including standard accessories like a dough paddle, flexible scraper paddle, wire whisk and dough hook. ) Its deep, handled stainless steel bowl locks in place with a twist, and the head tilts at the press of a button on the back.
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