hall@beta.DEC (DAN HALL DTN 264-5879) (03/26/85)
<> Chris Warth states that one should stay away from pasta extrusion machines - in his words, they make "really bad pasta". Bad compared to what? Compared to the store bought, boxed pasta that his home-made pasta blows away? I've tried all three, and couldn't agree more that home-made is the best, but then, that holds true for most foods (I haven't tried pasta done by hand with a rolling machine - too much like work!). I have to disagree about extruded pasta being bad. The differences in taste and texture are negligible. I wouldn't be able to say which was which if the two were placed in front of me. However, the differences in convenience are significant. It takes longer to boil 8 quarts of water than it does for me to go from the idea of pasta to the finished product (All right, I admit that that's using my girlfriend's Corning Ware topped stove. I haven't seen these discussed in this newsgroup - - Good!!) There's no kneading, no waiting for the dough to relax, no rolling and cutting which takes one arm more than the human body was equipped with, no drying, and best of all, you're not stuck with only flat noodles. My first experience with my Cuisinart pasta extruder yielded chili powder flavored ziti - Yum! I do have to warn against a cheapo pasta machine - stay away, they're junk!! There's just too much pressure requiring lots of power. Regardless of the method used, if you haven't tried home-made pasta yet, give it a go. It's amazing what you get from just flour and eggs! Dan Hall