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  • - So we're gonna twist here,

  • (gadget snaps)

  • and that didn't sound good, slowly,

  • (gadget snaps) hey, nope.

  • Hey everyone, I'm Joe, today I am testing out pasta gadgets.

  • We have several different pasta gadgets we found

  • from all over the Internet.

  • I'll be checking out these gadgets

  • based on these three criteria, if they make

  • the process easier, how well they work,

  • and are they a good value for the price.

  • I love pasta, let's get started.

  • We have a stainless steel pressure pasta surface machine.

  • It did come with free delivery.

  • This big old heavy-duty, countertop pasta extruder,

  • the Raviolamp pasta stamps, pasta stamp, pasta stamp.

  • This little guy here I am incredibly excited about,

  • little singing floating pasta timer, Mr. Al Dente,

  • restaurant cheese grater here, for grating cheese

  • for the pasta, there's pictures of pasta on it.

  • And last but not least we have a new

  • and improved Auoon Strainer.

  • We have all of our gadgets here, now all we need

  • is the pasta dough, and we can get to work.

  • (upbeat music)

  • All right, we've unboxed our pasta extruder here,

  • put this together,

  • gonna turn it on,

  • (machine beeps)

  • we're on.

  • Kind of makes me a little nervous, dealing with all

  • this plastic, normally I know metal is better.

  • Oh, we gotta add flour, so we're going to start there.

  • I have a mix of eggs and water.

  • Start,

  • (machine beeps)

  • mix, now this is where I slowly add my liquid,

  • kinda do 50, 50 here, that is what the recommended

  • dosage is on the box.

  • I think the timer in here says it only takes two minutes.

  • The extruder here, what it does is uses pressure

  • to force the dough through these different dies

  • in different shapes in order to make pasta.

  • It says it can make up to a pound and a half,

  • you know about a pound is good for two to four people.

  • In theory, dried box pasta is usually better

  • than anything you can make at home.

  • It turned off.

  • Oh, it looks like we're extruding.

  • The dough inside actually looks pretty good.

  • I don't know if it's okay, at this rate,

  • we'll have spaghetti by tomorrow.

  • It's like little baby spaghettis, coming out

  • into the world for the very first time.

  • It actually has texture on it, which is a good thing.

  • I'm gonna take a little bit of semolina flour here,

  • and give it a little dust, then we're gonna use this,

  • and that actually looks pretty promising.

  • I'm very impressed by this entire machine.

  • The question is, is it better than just buying

  • dried box of pasta.

  • You gotta have this whole machine, you have to wash it,

  • a box of spaghetti's only about a dollar.

  • The dough itself seems a little delicate and fragile,

  • I'm not sure if it's gonna hold up when we go to boil it.

  • Very curious to see how these are gonna cook up.

  • (jazzy music)

  • Now we're on to the handheld, old-fashioned version

  • of extruding pasta.

  • This is called a torchio, it's made by twisting the top

  • and you're forcing the dough through the bottom,

  • much like the extruder we were just using, but handheld.

  • The price of the real one is four or $500,

  • probably about twice as big.

  • Like this, and hangs over the edge of the table.

  • So that way you're like extruding, and you have

  • these big turning things.

  • Screw the bottom on,

  • so we're gonna twist here,

  • (gadget snaps)

  • and that didn't sound good.

  • We just squirted off the bottom, I heard a loud snap,

  • let's unwind, take two.

  • (camera beeps)

  • Slowly, slowly,

  • (gadget snaps) nope,

  • maybe I was doing it backwards,

  • (gadget snaps)

  • and we got another pop, it's falling apart.

  • The dough is creating too much pressure

  • inside of the die, looks like this guy's a bust.

  • I don't think that's gonna work.

  • (quick music)

  • We're going to test out the pasta we had extruded

  • with our countertop extruder, let's see if holds

  • when we cook it.

  • And we're goin' ahead and drop this into our water,

  • give it a little stir, break up the nests.

  • I have some tomato sauce, we're just gonna get started.

  • We're gonna pull one out, give it a little taste test.

  • Just about al dente there, we're gonna go up here

  • into our tomato, pull all of our noodles

  • out of the hot tub.

  • For the most part, they held together.

  • It's not falling apart, we got a nice good noodle

  • pulled there, time to try these out.

  • (piano music)

  • Now I have another pasta gadget here, my cheese grater.

  • Gonna break off a piece, slide it inside, that goes there,

  • and oh, my, gee, look at that.

  • Cheese grater worked great, did what it should,

  • kept it nice and easy.

  • You twirl it, and swirl it, and enjoy it.

  • I'm very happy with this.

  • We're gonna come back, test out our strainer,

  • test out our timer with some dry pasta from a box.

  • (honkytonk music)

  • All right, we have Al Dente, this guy's supposed

  • to sing to me at different intervals, it has four

  • different melodies, depending on the four different

  • cook points of Al Dente, you want to hit.

  • "That's Amore", the "Godfather theme",

  • "Tarantella Napolitana", and "The Prisoner's Choir."

  • He goes into the water pot with the dried pasta.

  • So this is not a regular timer, I don't know how

  • this works, some sort of witchcraft and wizardry,

  • this is kind of one of those magical moments.

  • I'll go with two handfuls of pasta, we're gonna go

  • Mr. Al Dente, into the water, and see what happens.

  • That's Amore, That's Amore, I think that's

  • how the song goes.

  • He's dancing, now we're just waiting for him to sing.

  • All of my years of culinary and cooking experience,

  • I am completely forgetting about and simply relying

  • only on Al Dente.

  • Al Dente, first name Al, last name Dente.

  • Think we're all,

  • ("That's Amore")

  • "That's Amore", we're gonna pull out one noodle,

  • okay, very undercooked, but maybe that's

  • for fresh pasta, the timer.

  • First round done, he's supposed to sing again.

  • We're hangin' out, in the kitchen,

  • ("Godfather theme")

  • I'd say we're a little more than halfway,

  • on the cook, that next timer might actually be perfect.

  • I don't understand why they don't make cellphones

  • out of this, where you could just drop it

  • into a pot of boiling water.

  • ("Tarantella Napoletana")

  • If you're not a pasta pro, I mean,

  • I think this could actually be useful.

  • At the very least, it just reminds you to check

  • the water, and you're testing the pasta.

  • That's al dente, Mr. Dente, you nailed it.

  • (jazzy music)

  • Next pasta tool here, this is like a silicone strainer

  • of sorts that clamps onto the pot,

  • that goes there,

  • and then we're gonna try this pouring motion.

  • We got a little bit of leakage, in the back,

  • but it's catching all the pasta.

  • Wow, that actually worked pretty well.

  • Kinda goes against, you know, what I would normally do,

  • 'cause I like the pasta water, I feel like you need that,

  • with the sauce.

  • This is small, compact, and I mean it does the job.

  • Sounds like his innards are still working.

  • Thank you, Al Dente, I could not have done it

  • (timer ringing) without you.

  • (stealthy music)

  • We have this box set of ravioli molds.

  • I have my pasta sheets, I have a cheese filling,

  • little bit of spinach pureed in here, in my bag.

  • We'll pipe filling into each of these,

  • I always like a little spritz of water,

  • then we have our other sheet we're going to place on top.

  • And then we should be able to roll right down,

  • oop, we got a little excess, that's okay.

  • In theory, with force, this should cut our shapes, too.

  • You can see it kind of working, then if we pop it out,

  • we have our shapes.

  • They didn't cut all the way in the center,

  • but, we have this other tool here, which actually might

  • work out to our advantage.

  • Pretty easy, pretty painless, they got a good weight

  • to them, the filling held up, they're sealed.

  • And we have all of our little raviolis.

  • We'll go and try the traditional way

  • that I have always done it.

  • (circus music)

  • They feel really light, and flimsy.

  • So I have a sheet of pasta,

  • I have my filling, always like to get a little gauge,

  • we have our top sheet, to lay over.

  • We have our stamp.

  • (stamp bangs)

  • See, to me, I feel like this is the way to do it.

  • Maybe have a little bit of waste but you could always

  • roll this out, re-use it, get another sheet out of it.

  • At the end of the day, you could cook all of these up,

  • have a delicious pasta in minutes.

  • Probably won't stand up to work in a restaurant,

  • but, for casual pasta-making, pretty good bargain.

  • (soft jazzy music)

  • All right, we've tested out

  • all these pasta gadgets that we found.

  • Time to break down my final thoughts.

  • Tabletop counter version of extruding pasta,

  • I like the way this worked.

  • It takes up quite a bit of space, it's not very fast,

  • but if you're looking for an extruder,

  • how much does this cost?

  • - [Man] Hundred fifty.

  • - $150, to me that's a little pricey.

  • I'm gonna give it a three out of five,

  • just because it did a good job.

  • Handheld extruder, this did not hold up,

  • could not review it, essentially, how much did that cost.

  • (cash register clunks)

  • $20, lot of times you get what you pay for,

  • I believe in this case, that is true.

  • I'm gonna give that a zero, because it didn't work.

  • Next we had our cheese grater for pasta garnishes

  • and grating cheese accoutrements, this worked wonderfully.

  • Like when you're at you're favorite super-classy

  • Italian restaurant and they come over, and they ask you

  • to say when, when you're getting your cheese on top

  • and then you kinda feel like that person

  • that never wants to say when, and the pile just keeps

  • getting bigger and you're oh, wait, is that just me?

  • This worked really well, how much does it cost?

  • (cash register clunks)

  • $17, I think that's a little too much for a tool

  • like this, it doesn't really hold a big piece of cheese.

  • 2 1/2, 2 1/2 just 'cause I don't see the value,

  • for $17 in a cheese grater like that.

  • Al Dente, the singing pasta timer.

  • I was blown away by this, it's next level dark arts,

  • but how much did this cost?

  • (cash register clunks)

  • $20 for Al Dente, I don't think the value's there

  • for the money, you could definitely get a kitchen timer.

  • Definitely not worth $20, but perhaps it's like

  • one of those holiday gag gifts, or like a birthday

  • present for someone you only kinda like.

  • I'm gonna give this a three out of five.

  • Next our silicone strainer, how much did this cost?

  • (cash register chings)

  • $11, seems like a pretty good deal, takes up less space,

  • if you have a tiny kitchen, than a big colander.

  • It held the whole pot of pasta, strained the water,

  • no problem, I'm gonna say four,

  • four out of five on this one.

  • Finally, our ravioli tools here, ravioli trays,

  • the first time I've used these, they could have done better.

  • I'm sure they get easier, the more you use them.

  • (cash register chings)

  • $40, I think that's probably a pretty good deal,

  • make a lot of raviolis really fast, I'd give that a four.

  • And then the stamp tools, they're just inexpensively made,

  • they're not sturdy, they're not heavy duty,

  • but they could get the job done for small amounts of pasta.

  • These cost,

  • (cash register chings)

  • $17, that sounds about right.

  • I'm not upset with that price at all.

  • 17 bucks, I mean, four out of five, not a bad option there.

  • But I think my favorite, except for the price,

  • is our little singing friend, Al Dente.

  • If you wanna check out any of these gadgets we used

  • today, all the links are in the description below.

  • That's it for today, reviewed all of these pasta gadgets

  • we found on the Internet.

  • Thanks for sticking around.

  • If you guys have any other gadgets you want me to review,

  • please leave a comment down below, or if you wanna see

  • some next level pasta making, check me out on Instagram,

  • chef.joe.sasto, thanks.

- So we're gonna twist here,

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