How to Clean a New Pasta Maker

Clean your new machine before making homemade pasta.

Homemade pasta is on a totally different culinary level from pasta in a box, and many people simply will not settle for second best. Making homemade pasta can be surprisingly easy with the use of a pasta maker. Your new pasta maker will come ready to use, but sometimes has a liberal coating of lubricating oil on the rollers. Manufacturers recommend never submerging your pasta maker in water, so you must use another method to remove this oil, which would otherwise get into your first few batches of pasta.

Things You'll Need

• Flour
• Eggs
• Measuring cup
• Bowl
• Fork
• Soft brush

Instructions

1. Place 3 1/2 cups of flour in a bowl. Make a well in the center of the flour pile. Place four eggs into the center of the well. Mix the eggs up with a fork and incorporate the surrounding flour into the eggs. Mix more and more flour with the eggs until you have mixed all of the ingredients together.

2. Place the mixture onto a floured board and knead for five minutes. If the dough is very sticky, add 1/2 cup more flour. Knead until the dough is smooth and elastic. Cover the dough in plastic wrap and let it sit for 20 minutes.

3. Attach your pasta maker to the edge of a table, using the clamp. Do not put on any cutting attachments at this time.

4. Pull off a ball of dough about the size of a tennis ball. Set your pasta rollers to the widest opening. Push your pasta through the roller, turning the crank to smash the pasta.

5. Set the rollers to smaller and smaller openings, putting the pasta sheet through each time that you reduce the size. The pasta will pick up oil residue from the rollers when it goes through the opening. Continue rolling the pasta until you have used the smallest opening. Discard this pasta.

6. Pull off another ball of pasta dough and repeat the steps. Inspect the pasta as it comes out of the rollers. You may see black or brown oil on the surface of the dough. As long as the dough is still picking up oil, continue putting more dough through the machine. When you don't see any more oil, discard the last dough and begin to make pasta to eat.

Tips & Warnings

• Use this same process to clean the cutting attachments the first time that you use them. It is less common to find oil on the cutters, but dust may have settled inside, so cleaning is a good idea.

References

• Fantes Kitchen Ware Shop: Marcato Atlas Pasta Maker Instructions
• Food Network.com: Fresh Pasta