How do ya'll cook pasta?

M

mandino

New member
We’ve offered baked pastas since we opened. We buy precooked noodles, run them under hot water for about a minute, put sauce and cheese on, and run them through the oven. It’s worked fine. The only problem is that we are confined to only a few pastas. I would like to really expand our pasta menu, but I’m not sure what I need to cook the pasta.

At the present time, we don’t have anything except an oven and microwave in our kitchen. I know that I can buy a hot plate and stockpot and cook pasta, and I’ve seen the mesh inserts that go into the pot that seems like it would work well. I’ve also been looking into the NEMCO pasta cooker and it looks pretty slick. I didn’t know if anyone has ever used one?

My concern is that we don’t sell an over amount of pasta, we may sell a few on a Monday and Tuesday, and as much as 8-10 on a Friday or Saturday. If I have the stockpot, I don’t know if I can get the water to a boil and cook the pasta in enough time if the water isn’t already boiling.

With the Nemco Cooker, the water is boiling all the time, so you can turn it on during a rush and keep it boiling. It works similar to a fryer.

I would be very interested to know how other people do it which would help me know if the Nemco unit was overkill, or necessary. Thanks.

http://www.fryerworld.com/nemco-6750.html
 
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unless your oven does not have any burners, forget that thing…get a 4 insert pasta cooker and thats it…we sell alot of pasta so we use it to finish as we get orders and par boil large amounts in a stock pot ahead of time for our rush

the money you save in cooking your own noodles will pay for the thing in no time
 
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WOW! Your ROI on that thing would be long. There must be smaller (more affordable) options for the little bit of pasta you run right now. If you had other means of using the $800 unit, then I’d say something else.

Even a plug-in countertop roaster would be more affordable and flexible than that unit is. Seems Nemco makes one and sells at warehouse clubs for $40 or less. Yeah, it is not heavy duty, and may wear out in a year or two . . . but it may pay for itself quickly, and would be a less expensive entree into the world of water boiling appliances. Get some round plastic silverware inserts (like for racks at cafeterias), and you have a reheating method that won’t scratch any non-stick coating you may have. I am going to try using stainless ones since I got a good price on them, and may use them a lot more often . . . and put them in a large boiling pot on my 6-burner stove. I only need about 45 to 60 seconds in simmering water for refreshing par-cooked pasta.
 
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Necessity is the mother of invention. I had a deep fryer we werent using and i got to thinking hmmm, turned in on low through in some water and can cook the heck out of some pasta now.
 
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We cook 5lbs of each pasta at a time (ling, fett, and spag). We under cook the noodles just a tad, for about 6 minutes. Toss cooled noodles in pomace, portion noodles into individual serving baggies. They’ll stay for about 4 or 5 days. We then keep a small pot of water at medium heat all night and reheat the individual pasta’s as needed. With baked ziti and macaroni and cheese we make a 10lb batch at a time and portion to serve, nuke, sauce, bake. Voila.
 
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