Half the country seems to have a memory of a yellow-brown Mason Cash bowl on a grandparent’s table, full of Christmas pudding mix with everyone taking a turn to stir. That’s a big part of why people still buy them.
But nostalgia doesn’t beat a cake batter. I wanted to know whether this heavy old bowl actually does anything a cheap plastic one can’t.
This is the classic Mason Cash cane bowl, size 12. It’s 29cm across and 14cm tall, holding 4 litres, made from earthenware with a chip-resistant glaze, and dishwasher safe. The shape is wide and fairly shallow, and the raised pattern on the outside and rim is there for grip.
Four litres is a proper baking size. It’ll take a full Christmas cake mix, a double batch of mince pie pastry, or a loaf’s worth of bread dough without you scattering flour across the worktop.
Heavy is a good thing here
A light plastic bowl skates around when you’re creaming butter and sugar with a wooden spoon. You end up holding it with one hand, or wedging it on a damp tea towel. A Mason Cash bowl mostly just sits there. That’s the single biggest difference, and if you mix by hand at all, you’ll notice it straight away.
The pattern on the outside does a job too. The flat panels let you tip the bowl on its side and rest it at an angle while you beat, which is easier on your wrist with a stiff mix. Bakers have been doing that with these bowls for decades.
Earthenware also doesn’t hold smells or stains the way old plastic does. A plastic bowl that’s had curry marinade in it is never quite the same for meringue.
A few downsides
Nothing’s perfect, and this has the obvious trade-offs of a big ceramic bowl.
- It’s heavy. Great on the worktop, less great when you’re scraping batter into a tin with one hand. Lift it with both.
- It can break. Chip resistant isn’t drop proof. A tiled floor will win.
- It takes up cupboard space. It doesn’t nest neatly with other bowls.
My take
If you mix mostly with an electric mixer, a cheap bowl does the job fine. The weight matters much less when a machine does the work. We’ve covered a decent hand mixer for Christmas baking if that’s your route.
If you stir by hand, bake a lot over winter, or like the idea of a bowl that’ll still be around for the next generation’s pudding stirring, I’d say yes. It’s not expensive for something that lasts that long, and it genuinely makes hand mixing less of a fight.
