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- Verified Buyer
love this machine. purchased a cheap one a year or so ago from some vendor on eBay. the first time i tried to use it, i threw it to the floor and gave it a good blunt kick. it went in the trash. please be advised, though, that particular unit was a very cheap knock off. so i bought one from bedbath and it was okay, but for the price it just wasnt reasonable. came across the atlas and it went on sale here, so i ordered it. got the red one. that was a month ago. what ive found is this: dont be intimidated. you will find that the pasta is pretty forgiving. so long as the dough is firm enough when you roll it and cut it that it will cut. if you run your sheets through the blades to cut your pasta and it all sticks together, it is too soft. you either add it all back together, add more flour and knead it again, or simply let the sheets hang and dry for 40 minutes and then run them through the cutters. like i posted above, it is pretty forgiving. my last batch, i boiled some spinach in a cup of water over the stove burner, mulched it with the blender, let it cool, added a teaspoon of salt and then added bread flour until a nice dough formed. rested it for twenty minutes in a ziplock sammich bag. then rolled out spinach spaghetti. it was very easy, no real measuring, and i didnt even add eggs. also, i doled out size 7 sheets. next time i will dial it to a 5 for thicker strands. play some trial and error and have fun doing it. experiment with the types of dough you like. different flours, spinach or carrot (steam and then mulch in water with garlic in the blender works very well), eggs or no eggs, salt or more salt. it's fun to experiment. also, most website recipes call for semolina flour for authentic italian homemade pasta. the word on the forums is: wheat durum semolina flour is what is used in italian factories, but in the small shops regular flour is all that is ever really needed. just a hint on that. if all you have is all purpose flour, that will work just fine.it wipes down well so clean up is effortless. havent had any problem with dough sticking to the machine blades, but the bottom has a set of three plastic brackets that can be removed so that a brush can be used to scrape away dry bits. another word from the internet forums is vaseline oil, what here in america is called mineral oil, if you ever need to lub it at all. that said, i havent had any problems with any discoloration of my pasta.the booklet comes with instructions on how to use it as well as a few basic recipes.this does make for some very thin spaghetti noodles if you dial your pasta sheets all the way to a 9. like ramen noodle. dialed to a 7 is a little thicker than vermecilli. i think i will go up to about a 5 from now on to have it more like languini, which is a pretty perfect noodle for most dishes. the point is that you can experiment to find what is best for you. this is a pretty versatile machine, it is a little workhorse. i'm uploading a couple of pictures, there are already so many uploaded. but this was a batch that i used one egg and parsley garlic and roasted red bell peppers and bread flour with a teaspoon of salt. rather basic recipe that came out pretty perfect and it was fun and very easy to eat. happy rolling.
