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CucinaPro 150

CucinaPro 150 Imperia Pasta Maker

Offering a 6” wide roller as well as a double cutter head that can make wide fettuccine and thin spaghetti noodles, CucinaPro 150 Imperia Pasta Maker allows you to make the freshest pasta at the comfort of your own home.  Made of glossy chromed plated steel, this unit also features a good wood grip handle and an easy-lock adjustment dial. Optional attachments which are sold separately allow users to make a wide variety of noodle styles.  CucinaPro 150 Imperia Pasta Machine weighs 1 pound and measures 9 x 6 x 6 inches. Continue reading

The Costs of Buying a House and Things to Factor in Long Term

Never has it been more difficult to get onto the property ladder. Since the financial crash in 2008, young people have found getting onto that first step of the property ladder a lot more difficult than their parents’ generation. Saving up a deposit for the property is essential when it comes to getting a mortgage but saving up the large amount that lenders are now asking for is something that many people struggle with. For many, the only option is to live with parents in order to save up, or in some cases for ‘the bank of mum and dad’ to lend money to kids for a deposit on a property.

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As well as the cost of the deposit, it is also necessary to make sure that when you are in a position to buy that you also have the money saved up for the other costs associated with purchasing a property of your own.

Some mortgage companies will charge a valuation fee – this is usually based on the value of the property, however some mortgage lenders do not charge this, so this is something worth looking into. Generally, the more you have saved for a deposit, the larger range of mortgages and generally better deals will be available to you.

As well as considering the right mortgage for you, you will also need to think about the other things that need to be paid for when you have decided to go ahead with purchasing a property. Solicitors are something that you will definitely need to deal with the legal documents and to ensure that everything is done correctly.

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As well as the solicitor’s paperwork, you will also need to get a survey done. There are many levels of survey which vary in detail – the older the property then the more that may potentially be problematic with it – you will need to find a local company like this building survey Birmingham company Sam Con.

Once you have paid for this to be done and it is nearing the big day when you finally get the keys to the property, there are still costs to factor in. For moving day, you may want to hire a removal service, and then there are also the ongoing costs to consider once you are in.

Find out what council tax band the property is in so that you will be able to work put how much you will have to pay for this. You also need to have a look into the costs of utility bills – you could shop around for this as the prices vary so you could save a fortune!

Essential Christmas sweets: The Gourmet Gift packs

We propose different options to give you kitchen products made by ourselves at Christmas. Original, unique, homemade, and cheap gifts.

Christmas is when we usually exchange gifts, but we must not spend a lot of money. Self-made gifts are a great alternative to commercial products. These are unique, homemade, and inexpensive gifts. On this occasion, we propose amazing ideas for Christmas sweets that should always be like the lots of gourmet gifts made up of them and we give ideas on how to present them:

Coin chocolates for Christmas

These chocolates or coins with nuts, spices, and other ingredients are a perfect gift option. An original sweet, made with love and with a spectacular presentation. What better than these chocolates to make a special gift? Deliver them in a box with Christmas motifs and close it with a bow in gold or red tones.

Chocolate truffles

Chocolate truffles are a Christmas classic. Very easy to make at home and perfect to give at Christmas or any special occasion. Choose some pretty pastry capsules to present and store them in a box. If you prefer, you can also put them in a bag and close them with a bow.

Gingerbread and cinnamon

How to prepare homemade gingerbread and cinnamon cookies for Christmas? They are very easy to make and they are delicious. Children can help decorate them and give them fun shapes: tree, doll, star … They will love it! To give them away, you just need a nice box, paper to put on the bottom, and a red bow.

Polvorones candy

Polvorones are probably the most popular Christmas candy. You can make them at home and give them away in recycled boxes decorated for the occasion. Also, you can wrap them with a nice cellophane paper as if they were candies.

Homemade chocolate and hazelnut

Nougat is one of the most precious Christmas sweets. There are different types. But, without a doubt, the one that triumphs the most is the chocolate one. In Open Kitchen, we teach you how to make homemade chocolate and hazelnut nougat in a very simple way and without an oven.

Marzipan and Caramelized Almonds

Marzipan is one of the most popular Christmas sweets. Surprise your friends or family with a box of hand-made marzipan, accompanied by caramelized almonds. You can keep marzipan in a box, like cookies or chocolates, and caramelized in a transparent bag with a red bow.

Homemade berry jam

Jam is a delicious way to preserve fruit even out of season. You can make a homemade orange, apple, pear, or berry jam. On this occasion, we have chosen the one with fruits of the forest since it is perfect for decorating Christmas desserts or taking with rolls and a little pate. Cover the jar’s lid with a piece of cloth and tie it with a bow or kitchen string, which will give it a rustic, craftsman look. You can also add a label indicating the name of the product and the date of manufacture.

A cookie tree

Get or make yourself a structure in the shape of a Christmas tree with a wire that you can mold without problems and attach cookies like these. Star-shaped cookies painted with colored sugar. You will have to make a little hole to pass them a small string.

For handymen

With cardboard, you can fold well, make boxes like these, shaped like Christmas candy, and paint them with glitter paint to simulate the candy canes’ red stripes. Ideal to surprise your guests with marzipans inside, for example.

Bottles with life

“Dress them up” as reindeer with four easy details: red nose beads, eye stickers, and brown pipe cleaners to create the antlers. Decorate a side table with them during the Christmas holidays and you will see how many “visitors” it receives.

Romantic bags

Get some kraft paper bags (it is the best for this detail), fill them with sweets, close them by covering them with a paper base for a round tray like these and to close the bag, make two holes, pass a cord with red stripes and tie with him a candy cane.

Do you already know what details you are going to do this year? Well, get in, and never better said. Because, this year, sweets are must-have pieces. The Christmas sweets give a vintage touch to your home and are very practical. Don’t try to make a hole at your table for your sweet creations. They will be so beautiful that they will deserve a special place.

make homemade pasta

History of Pasta

As not everyone is familiar with the differences between fusilli, fettuccine, and farfalle, many people have come across a dish of spaghetti Bolognese or maybe enjoyed a plate full of lasagna. In some British occupied homesteads, spaghetti has been a standard feature during dining times as early as the 1960s. It turns out to be a staple when it comes to children meals tuna-pasta-sweetcorn can be handy in maintaining students through their schooling years in cases where they board in school. A survey done globally has highlighted that pasta is the world’s most known dish ranked above the rice, pizza, and meat. Despite pasta being popular in many European countries, pasta was also one of the favorite dishes of the Guatemala, Brazil, South Africa and Philippines. Digits produced by International Pasta Organizations indicate Venezuela as the largest consumer of pasta followed closely by Italy. The top features the likes of Chile. Peru, and Tunisia. The survey also sheds some light on Argentinians, Mexicans, and Bolivians and the result shows that people from these countries consume more pasta than the British. Continue reading

best pasta machine

Commercial Pasta Making Machines for your Restaurant or Factory

More restaurants today serve Italian cuisines and pasta as its demand increases. Pasta is easy to make and requires lesser time to prepare compared to other dishes. Fast food restaurants are a favorite among people looking for convenience. However, today people are shying away due to health complications brought about by fast foods. There are over 28 pasta variants which give chefs more freedom to play around with their dishes and help impress their clients with their culinary skills. Restaurant and factories process huge amounts of pasta and will be more inclined to using commercial pasta making machines. Below are the best 5 pasta making machines. Continue reading

Five min pasta

How to Eat Pasta and Still Lose Weight?

While trying to lose weight many consider wheat-based foods completely off-limits. The main reason why many people shy away from eating wheat-based foods is that they contribute to weight gain. Pasta contains refined carbohydrates which get broken down easily thus get used up very fast and have very little nutritional value. After eating food high in refined carbohydrates one will experience a short burst of energy then you will feel sluggish and hungry again. This feeling will lead one to eat more and stay dormant.

Eat pasta foods with a low glycemic load

Foods with a low glycemic load are slower in increasing blood sugar levels. High sugar levels in the blood are dangerous as it increases the chances of one suffering from cardiovascular attacks. The human body stores sugar as fat in the body. This means that when one takes pasta with high glycemic load their weight increases rapidly plus they are at the risk of heart attacks. People who train heavily will tend to eat food high in glycemic load due to the energy required by intense physical activities. The excess sugars are converted into glucose and converted into energy needed by the body. However, if you are looking to lose weight the last thing you would want on your plate is food high in glycemic load. Many pasta diets are high in glycemic load and we should eat pasta in moderation. Here are some pasta foods with a low glycemic load: Spaghetti, Noodles, Linguine, Vermicelli, Shells, and Capellini.

If your workout sessions are not that rigorous, eating food with a low glycemic load will help you lose weight. The body will burn up more carbohydrates than we are consuming.

Have intense workout sessions If you find yourself eating pasta high in carbohydrates, having intense work sessions is your solution to burning the excess calories. If your job does not entail intense physical activity then you may find yourself gaining weight. Gaining weight is dangerous for your health and one has to watch their weight. Running for quite some team will burn a lot of energy. The excess sugars in your blood are quickly used and this prevents you from gaining weight. Have a timetable on when to jog and work out. Working out requires dedication and discipline which is not easy. You can look for a partner and stay true to the mission, in the long run, you will lose weight. Find a local gym if you cannot find friends to work out with and the instructor will give you the best workout routines. If you follow your routine religiously you will shed your extra weight and still enjoy pasta dishes. By cutting down your weight you are avoiding many weight-related complications. Work might be taking up a lot of time and you still can find ways to exercise. Cycling to and from might be a great way of cutting your weight. There are tons of ways how we can lose weight and stay in shape.

Dieting

Dieting is a great way of losing weight and nutritionists recommend it. Following a strict diet routine is tough since we have to restrain ourselves from eating anything and everything. While dieting we take foods that we do not normally take. Supplementing pasta with other high-fiber foods helps in losing weight. Try adding vegetables into your sauces and more fruits in the salads. Many people prefer meaty sauces which contribute to gaining weight and increases the chances of one having a heart attack. Avoiding such sauces can help one lose weight. Vegetables and fruits are highly nutritious and physicians recommend that we include them in our meals. You can reduce the amount of pasta and increase vegetables in your diet. Food high in fiber helps in cutting weight and is healthy. Fiber makes you stay fuller and focused all along the day. Dieting should not translate to you starving yourself in order to cut weight. Staying hungry makes you grouchy and easily irritable, this can affect your relationship with other people. You can find many dieting tips online and you should avoid straining yourself when it comes to dieting. Creating a good dieting plan will help you stay on track and monitor your daily food intake.

Add cereals and grains to your dough Experts recommend that we add cereals and grains to our pasta. Cereals such as millet, barley, rye, corn and whole grains can be included in the flour. To avoid destroying the texture of the dough, we should have the grains milled. Cereals and grains add vital minerals to the pasta such as omega -3 fatty acids, vitamins, phosphorous and fiber. Various recipes are available on how to mix the flour together and achieve great results. Cereals are a rich source of unsaturated fats and antioxidants which play a great role in reducing cholesterol levels. Antioxidants help in reducing weight by helping the body burn excess fats in the body.

Various pasta makers will help you create delicious pasta. Cereals and grain are excellent sources of vitamins crucial for the body’s well-being. If you are not comfortable with changing your pasta, you might opt to use cereals in your soup or sauce. This ensures your diet is full of nutrients and beneficial to your weight loss journey.

Conclusion

Losing weight is frustrating especially if we do not watch what we eat. Pasta is blamed for being ineffective in reducing weight and many people will avoid eating pasta totally. However, there are low glycemic load pasta recipes that one can try and still successfully lose weight. Combining the various weight loss methods discussed above will help one in the weight loss journey. If you are worried about adding weight then you can make pasta in moderation and stay fit. Low carb diet works hand in hand with working out in helping to lose weight and avoiding lifestyle diseases. Always supplement your diet with fruits, vegetables, and cereals so as to stay fit.

Electric pasta maker is great for lots of dishes

Pasta makers come in different brands and types that vary in size, shape, price, functionality, and overall performance. A pasta maker can either be manual or electric; some can work both ways. Although seasoned folks prefer using manual pasta machines, electric pasta makers are quickly gaining popularity because they do (almost) everything for you especially if you’re new to making pasta. This makes electric pasta makers great for lots of pasta dishes. There’s also a slight difference between electric pasta makers and fully automatic pasta makers… but we will get to that later on as we go deeper into the topic. So what makes an electric pasta maker so special? And how do they come in handy when preparing various pasta dishes?

#1: Easy to Use — Easy Mixing, Easy Rolling, Easy Cutting

This is an advantage for both veteran home pasta makers and beginners as well. Powered by an electric motor, electric pasta machines simplify dough rolling and cutting to kindergarten play. Easy peasy lemony squeezy! Using an average electric pasta maker still requires you to mix and knead the dough manually. The electric pasta machine then helps you with the rolling and cutting. All you have to do is place your small piece of square -shaped, hand -patted, flat dough between the rollers and slowly work it through using both hands.

You can work on the dough while adjusting the thickness until you achieve the desired size of pasta. From there, you can effortlessly run the ready dough through the cutter to get the strands of pasta you want or you can push the dough out through an electric pasta extruder. As many home pasta makers will tell you, rolling the dough with a pin and cutting it to even strips is not an easy thing to do by hand.

An electric pasta maker like the Lello (2730) Pro runs on a 300 watt motor to automatically mix the dough for you (up to 3lbs in 30 minutes flat!), and also extrude the finished dough as linguine, spaghetti, maccheroni, fettuccine, lasagna, bucatini and angel hair! This gives you the opportunity to decorate your dining table with different pasta dishes every time you feel like eating pasta. Another automatic pasta machine that comes highly recommended is definitely the Phillips HR2357. Despite a similarity in mode of operation and service elivery between the Lello and the Phillips, the Phillip appears to be way ahead in terms of performance and reliability. Furthermore, the Phillips (2357) offers more pasta options such as pappardelle and tagliatelle in addition to all the options you can get with the Lello. One more thing you should probably also know about electric pasta machines with automatic mixers is that they give you the opportunity to play around with the ingredients you can include in your pasta recipes. You can go wild with herbs and veggies as much or as little as you want. The possibilities are virtually endless.

#2: Consistent Results and Reliability

Daily preparation of homemade pasta is almost an impossible feat for the average person to pull off without the help of a pasta machine. Consistency is also another major issue especially for those who are still new to making pasta from home. However, all this can be made possible by investing in a good pasta maker. Most electric pasta machines come with amazing recipes that are easy to replicate day in day out and the resulting pasta is (almost) always the same. The advantage of a well built pasta maker is that it can endure constant abuse even when used on a daily basis! And that’s without faltering in performance. Please note that many people just starting out on making pasta from home cannot produce the same quality dough even if they made two dough batches in immediate succession. However, a fully automatic pasta maker with a mixer can produce hundreds of batches of the same quality dough.

#3: Availability of Cool Accessories

Although pasta makers like the Phillips HR2357/05 come fully loaded with a mixer and an extruder to make things kindergarten easy for you, some of them like KitchenAid require you to purchase a separate stand mixer and 3 different head attachments for tagliatelle, flat -sheet pasta and linguine. However, you can avoid all this hustle by getting the KitchenAid KPEXTA extruder attachment that has 6 pasta shaping discs (plates) to help you expand the creativity on your pasta creations.

You have a choice of up to 8 pasta shaping discs (dies) for different pastas with the Phillips and the Magic Mill DeLonghi pasta makers. The Magic Mill DeLonghi pasta shaping dies give you options for linguine, ravioli, lasagna, spaghetti, tagliatelle, fettuccine, biscuit, and macaroni. The Phillips pasta maker gives you options like spaghetti, angel hair, tagliatelle, pappardelle, lasagna, and penne. It also has a small drawer where you can store all your shaping discs.

The Marcato Atlas Wellness pasta machine on the other hand is bought separately from the 2 -speed motor.

This makes it easy to replace the electric part only if it breaks down. You can also continue using the pasta machine manually as you wait for your replacement motor to be delivered! This is more of a “hybrid” pasta maker since it can deliver the best of both worlds. More accessories include cleaning brushes, measuring cups, pasta cutters, and ravioli stamps.

#4: Faster Preparation

As mentioned earlier, rolling pasta dough is not a walk in the park! You have to go a few rounds with a rolling pin to get the precise pasta thickness you’re going and this is not even guaranteed. Plus, it takes a century to cut the pasta to precision especially if you’re making a big family -size batch at once; or different batches of differently shaped pasta. Automatic electric pasta makers take a lot of the pasta making process off your hands leaving you with more time to concentrate on the sauce or soup. You can use most of these automatic pasta makers to prepare your pasta from start to finish by simply pressing a few buttons. Better yet, you can prepare a complete pasta dish from scratch in less than an hour if you know what you’re doing. For instance, the Imperial pasta maker can make up to 12 different types of pasta from a pound and a half of dough in 10 minutes.

#5: Extra Useful Features

Some pasta makers can do more than just make pasta. For instance, the Ronco Popeil P400 and the USEFUL pasta makers can be used to makes delicious sausages to go with your fresh pasta or for any other meal. As briefly pointed out earlier, the Magic Mill DeLonghi also helps you produce nicely shaped biscuits. The Imperial pasta machine mentioned above can also do pretzels, cookies, bread sticks and bagels.

Summary of Electric Pasta Makers Benefits

  • *Consistent results
  • *Easy to use
  • *A wide variety of pasta options and shapes
  • *Fast pasta preparation which saves you time
  • *Versatility
  • *Relatively cheap

Conclusion

To conclude this topic on electric pasta makers, it is safe to say that electric pasta machines are the perfect investment for people who want to enjoy fresh pasta rather than buy pasta stuffed full of preservatives from the store. Another thing that makes electric pasta makers such amazing gadgets is the fact that you can practically prepare any type of pasta you can think of depending on the features or functionalities or accessories available with your electric pasta maker of choice. This basically means you can mix it up or match it up whichever way you want. By this I mean you can have one “mix -crate” plate of pasta with all sorts of differently shaped pasta and in varied lengths too. The possibilities and combinations are only limited by your own creativity. These wonderful appliances make everything look and feel quite easy. Pasta experts (and sometimes keen beginners) making their own pasta from home can use these brilliant machines to make fresh pasta dishes in less than an hour. Most of these pasta makers are driven by 200 watt motors, which means they can produce batches of pasta faster than the average person doing everything by hand. Electric pasta makers are reliable and consistent when it comes to mixing dough, rolling it or cutting it to desired shapes and sizes. Get yourself a pasta maker today and change your pasta eating experience forever!

Pasta Maker Features What To Look For

Making pasta is a precise art. Well, it’s one of those culinary skills that many people want to practice from the comfort of their home kitchens or wish they could; but never really get the opportunity to because:

(1) they might not know how to go about it,

(2) they may not have the right tools for it…. in this case, a pasta maker, and lastly,

(3) they may not have the time. Continue reading

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