We love pasta, but thanks to our experience with this pasta maker, we realized that it was really just in an "Olive Garden Italian" kind of way. We'd pay a little more for an expensive, "authentic-looking" package of pasta when we felt adventurous enough to make some at home, but it never occurred to us that we might be able to MAKE our own, perhaps even better, pasta that would be about as much fun to make as it was tasty to eat.
Enter the Avance pasta maker. This unassuming gadget is a bit bigger than we expected, but it's very solidly built and comes with everything you need to get started trying/making your own pastas at home (except the ingredients, of course): some shaping discs for different pasta styles like spaghetti, penne, lasagna, etc., a tool that resembles a small windshield ice-scraper to cut the pasta to length as it emerges (Play-Dough style) from the front of the machine, and a specially designed cleanup brush and measuring cup. Sure, there is plenty of inspiration on YouTube or around the net for pasta recipes, but there was actually a very nice and reasonably extensive recipe book in the box to produce a multitude of flavors and textures for your next pasta meal. Note that the ratio of the dry to liquid ingredients in each recipe seems to be pretty important to get the extrusion process (squishing the noodles out of the shaping disc) in this machine to work properly, or even at all. The manual warns that the pasta maker was tested to success using their ingredient ratios, so any outside recipes or just "winging it" may have to involve a little math or experimentation to get satisfactory results from this machine. We made several different styles of pasta and each was very tasty and at least as good as any store-bought pasta, but the noodles had far more texture to grab the sauces and meats in the pot. It was definitely a different sensation than the kind of processed-smooth "Americanized" pasta we've gotten used to over the years, but the results won us over; even our super-fussy but pasta-loving kids consistently liked the results--I can't think of a more glowing recommendation than that.
Pasta making with this machine is dead simple. Pour the ingredients in the hopper, close the lid, turn it on, adjust the number of servings you intend to make using the button on the mercifully simple control panel, hit the Start button, and the machine [mostly] does the rest. It will start mixing and kneading, and once it does, you pour the water, or water & egg liquid, through a slit in the top of the lid. Then the machine continues on its merry way...7-10 or so minutes later--you get a beep, and the pasta starts extruding from the front of the machine. When the noodles hit the desired length, slide the cutter across the front of the shaping disc to cut the pasta as it emerges, and set it aside. The whole ordeal should take you maybe 10-20 minutes depending on how many servings you make. I was really surprised by how the dough looked when it was ready to start the extrusion process because it was still kind of loose and flour-like, nothing like what I traditionally associate with "dough." But we let the process continue and were very pleasantly surprised by the final results; I think you will be too, especially if you've never really tried your hand at home-made pastas before!
A few little niggles are worth mentioning. We found there was a bit of wasted dough when it was done, even after hitting the Extrusion Only program (about 3 minutes to run) to squeeze what little more we could from what was left over in the hopper. And maybe it was just us, but we needed to make least 2 batches to feed a family of 4; if you have some true pasta lovers on tap, we figure it will most likely take about 3 batches to satisfy a family that size, still with little to no leftovers. Fortunately, cleanup was [mostly] an easy affair. Everything comes apart simply by unscrewing the 2 front knobs; and everything that does separate from the main unit is dishwasher safe except for the front face-plate. The shaping discs were another matter. Other Philips pasta makers with these kinds of discs have included a little push-piece that mated to the holes in the shaping discs; you simply pressed down and it forced the pasta out of the holes. Maybe they didn't work well, or maybe it was to save on costs, but here, you get a little cleaning brush with a small poker at the other end to sweep and poke the pasta dough out of all the holes. It's not difficult, but it does take a couple of minutes to really get everything cleaned up. However, once you're done, virtually everything fits in a little pull-out drawer at the front of the unit--the discs, cutter, and brush/poker. The only thing that doesn't stow away neatly with the pasta maker is the measuring cup; but we absolutely LOVE having everything else in one place and not having to go searching for the right disc when we need it.
We have really enjoyed using this unit--so much so that we're considering buying a few other shaping discs separately to try our hand at angel-hair or rigatoni, too. Bottom line--for people who love pasta, but admittedly never had fresh, homemade pasta until now, we were absolutely impressed by the cooked texture and flavor of what we could make at home; definitely recommended.
