I hate sifting but I always do it. I was in a hurry once and didn't...big regret. I've used the mesh strainer but mine wasn't big enough so I went to the crank handle. It's ok. I may have to get a bigger mesh strainer. The best part is that hubby voluntarily started taking over the sifting for me. I put everything in and he sifts. I really don't deserve him. 
Melvira, is this the battery powered sifter you tried? It's gotten pretty good reviews and I've been considering ordering it but if it sucks, then I don't want to waste my money.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000JWLO6I/?tag=cakecentral-20
Thanks
Tracy, I've got to get up there to meet you AND your husband!
Kay, if you get a medium mesh like 7yyrt said you shouldn't have to use "more force". I think that maybe the mesh that you're using is too fine.
Melvira, is this the battery powered sifter you tried? It's gotten pretty good reviews and I've been considering ordering it but if it sucks, then I don't want to waste my money.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000JWLO6I/?tag=cakecentral-20
Thanks
GAR-BAGE. That looks exactly like the one I had. Like I said, if you are just sifting a little PS on top of a bundt cake, SURE, works great. Actually sifting to bake?? Start in October for the Christmas cake. 
I am SOOO glad that I am not the only one who lives in sifter hell. My son BEGGED me to buy him a sifter. I did. It just kept getting clogged up and 'holding' the PS. and cake mix wouldnt go through it for love or money.
I do have the mesh strainers, but mine might be too fine. they are more fine than a screen on a window. We have used them for PS- but it makes a HUGE mess and we just stopped. of course, it makes a much larger mess when its an 11 year old doing it... LOL
I have an electic sifter imported from Israel. Plug in, add 3 lb of flour or whatever, cover, and WALK AWAY! In a couple of minutes the work is done, pour onto wax paper and like a funnel pour into container or into mixer. It was about $100 but WORTH EVERY PENNY! It's like hiring an extra hand just to do the dreade sifting. I bought it in a local specialty housewares store. I'll try to get the name and address for anyone interested in getting one. I skipped right over all of your sifting woes! Electric is the way to go!
I use the WASC cakes and I was wondering how different the texture turns out when you sift the dry ingredients?
I have an electic sifter imported from Israel. Plug in, add 3 lb of flour or whatever, cover, and WALK AWAY! In a couple of minutes the work is done, pour onto wax paper and like a funnel pour into container or into mixer. It was about $100 but WORTH EVERY PENNY! It's like hiring an extra hand just to do the dreade sifting. I bought it in a local specialty housewares store. I'll try to get the name and address for anyone interested in getting one. I skipped right over all of your sifting woes! Electric is the way to go!
That is exactly what I'm looking for! Where did you get it?
Actually my perfect ides is a cupboard mounted one that holds like a 30-50 pound bag and then dispenses it. They have them, but so far the only ones I can find are antique replicas (not old, just made to LOOK like the old ones) for restoring old farmhouses and baker's tables and they say they are not approved for actual food use. WTH?? Then why make them? Can't they MAKE them food safe? Ya know, so they can be used for the purpose they were intended??
White Almond Sour Cream.
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=df4f9hbq_46cs9f28fs
My frosting uses two pounds of sugar so I purchase powdered sugar in two or four pound bags. If the bags have never been opened you don't need to sift. It's once you open the bag and have left over sugar and then decide to use it you will need to sift. I have a sifter with a little wooden handle and it turns instead of the trigger. I have both and boy the trigger sifter will give you arthritis. LOL.
Awatterson -
Is this the sifter you are talking about?
http://www.appliancehut.com/details.asp?productid=846
My frosting uses two pounds of sugar so I purchase powdered sugar in two or four pound bags. If the bags have never been opened you don't need to sift.
I would agree that you dont' HAVE to sift, but man, it makes a BIG difference in the texture of the icing and the cake when you do! I sift all of them. Always.
I'm in the column with those who say it takes just seconds to sift with the handled strainer pictured above.
Melvira, is this the battery powered sifter you tried? It's gotten pretty good reviews and I've been considering ordering it but if it sucks, then I don't want to waste my money.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000JWLO6I/?tag=cakecentral-20
Thanks
I use the Norpro battery operated sifter and overall I love it. However, on a scale of 1 to 10, I would give it a 5 or 6 - I would give manual sifting a -3.
If you try to fill the Norpro with your ingredient to be sifted, the weight of the ingredient prevents it from vibrating and it will take a couple of years to sift. But if you add about a cup at a time, it takes about 3 seconds to sift. My daughter, who does most of my baking was ready to quit until I purchased her one. So for me, in my final assessment of the Norpro, while it has its short comings, it kept my baker and therefore rates a 10!
You know, for some reason I never sift my cake ingredients. I am going to try it and see what I think. In what way does it change the texture? Does it make it lighter? I'm curious now, and I wonder why I don't do it.
A BEAUTIFUL textured cake!! Not as many airholes (because we've sifted out those big lumps that drop in the batter and make "tunnels" in the cake!); texture is nice and tight.
Absolutely a beautiful looking cake that only a caker can appreciate!
Do it once ... you'll be hooked for life.
When I was a little girl I would help my grannie bake. She was a sifter, or should I say I was THE SIFTER. She had this torture device that held about 1 cup of flour and she'd hand it to me and tell me to sift what seemed to be a 40 pound mountain of flour.
Not only did she want it sifted ONCE--I had to sift it twice. The second time I would sift in the baking powder, salt, etc.
ACK!
I loved my grannie dearly, but for years because of her blasted sifting fetish I took stupid short cuts with my baking. When I finally came back into the fold of sensiblity I grabbed the biggest screen strainer I could find and a big ole bowl and shake, shake, shake.. SMILE!
For whatever reason I still have my grannie's sifter. I should probably give it to my mother-in-law 
Sifting is essential in my opinion. By sifting ingredients, be it a box mix or a scratch recipe, we are aerating them making for an altogether lighter cake. If when making a scratch recipe we sift the flour along with baking powder and salt, we can also be more certain that the ingredients are fairly well mixed together before adding them to the butter/sugar/eggs or whatever.
Having said that, I agree that sifting is a pain. I use a metal sieve like the one in the picture and find that, for me, pushing flour or icing sugar through with a spoon is quicker than shaking it. I end up getting less on the work surface too. I am going to try the salad tossing movement though!
I didn't realize how many people hate sifting ( that doesn't sound like a word, do is?)anyway, I don't mind shifting. I also use a big mesh shifter like in the photo that is on this post. In the type of piping that I do, I have to sift the PS a few times then run it threw a stocking. That's what I HATE the most. In that same breath I do have to say that it sure makes the RI smooth smooth. kansaslaura I love that comment on giving your old shifter to your mother in law. I should get one of those Ikea one's for my mother in law 
OK GREAT, now I have to bake a cake tonight just to try it out! hahaha. Do you guys sift for things like cookies, too? I just never bother to. I sift icing sugar, but nothing else really. I'm a bad girl. But I'm SO good at it! Hahaha.
I always sift icing sugar, and always sift flour. Not only cos of the aerating thing but, and you can call me paranoid if you like, I hate the thought that there might be some little insect in the flour that ends up in my cake 
Bugs love flour.
Alright, you guys have convinced me. Here's a question, though. In Home Ec (back when there dinosaurs), we were taught to sift the flour first, and THEN measure the sifted flour. Is that how you all do it? You don't measure first and then sift, do you? I want to hear the consensus on this.
And, I was going by what I'd read on here: if the bag of 10x sugar wasn't opened, you didn't have to sift. Is that wrong? I've not sifted the unopened bags, and had no problem. I have been sifting the opened bags, though.
Alright, you guys have convinced me. Here's a question, though. In Home Ec (back when there dinosaurs), we were taught to sift the flour first, and THEN measure the sifted flour. Is that how you all do it? You don't measure first and then sift, do you? I want to hear the consensus on this.
And, I was going by what I'd read on here: if the bag of 10x sugar wasn't opened, you didn't have to sift. Is that wrong? I've not sifted the unopened bags, and had no problem. I have been sifting the opened bags, though.
On the flour issue, it depended on how the recipe was written. If it called for "1 cup, sifted", then you'd measure a cup of flour, then take that one cup and sift it.
Whereas "1 sifted cup" is you sift the flour, then carefully measure one cup out of the pile of sifted flour.
I either posted it in this thread or another thread ..... no, you don't HAVE to sift the p.sugar ... opened or unopened. I sift it because it just makes a better product.
You don't HAVE to put primer on your walls when you paint. But it sure makes a nicer looking wall when you do.
I feel like a dinosaur here. I'm still using a hand crank sifter after all these years. It's what I learned to bake with (Thanks, mom! (she was a home ec major in college)). I don't find it problematic except when I need to do large cakes and am double batching.
I've decided that I need bigger bowls and a larger mesh strainer!!
And for all of us who agree that it sucks: http://www.bakelove.com/sifthappens_t-shirt_brown.html
Enjoy! 
emrldsky, I LOVE that t-shirt. I have a very large mesh strainer/bowl thing that is almost too big for my largest mixing bowl but the sifting goes pretty quickly. It has a larger mesh than most so it's probably not a super fine sift, but I can live with that
I got a bigger strainer because mine was a fine mesh and that made it super hard to sift. I made a cake and sifted the ingredients. It took about 5 seconds. It made a great textured cake. I will continue to sift the ingredients from now on. I sifted the PS for the buttercream. It took FOREVER to sift with the same strainer. What am I doing wrong?
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