Pasta Express (infomercial product)

[The Shirker]

Has anyone actually tried this thing (and willing to admit it)? Does it actually work? I don't know why but I'm mesmerized by the commercials. I'm repelled but intrigued at the same time :lol: I can see how maybe it would work with fresh pasta but not the dried stuff.

http://blog.foodienyc.com/images/pastaexpress.jpg

[ratface]

What's the idea? You microwave the pasta in the plastic tube to cook it? Microwave pasta tends to be mushy. Don't see how the shape of the container or vents on the top could change that.

[IronMac]

No, the idea is to pour boiling hot water into the cylinder after you put the pasta in, then the pasta "cooks" in the cylinder. (READ IT FIRST BEFORE COMMENTING.)

[The Shirker]

No - supposedly all you do is add boiling water to pasta in the container and in minutes it will magically cook. They also say you can use it for vegetables, hotdogs (eww!) and shrimp.

Just fill the Pasta Express tube with pasta, add boiling water, snap on the self-straining lid and watch the cooking action begin. The thermal lid keeps the water at the perfect cooking temperature. Turn the pasta tube over to strain and your pasta is ready to serve in minutes.

No pots, pans or colanders needed.

The Pasta Express cooks up to one pound of pasta or vegetables. It’s made of durable, dishwasher safe plastic so cleanup is fast and easy.

[el_diablo007]

I'm intrigued by it as well, my parents laugh at it.

[Squiggles]

Is it really so difficult to cook pasta on the stove?

[rc51]

Is it really so difficult to cook pasta on the stove?

Not really difficult..but really you use alot more water and energy to heat up the water than necessary.

I actually find it cheaper to go out for pasta than cooking it at home...especially for one person.

We have a place here in Cgy.that serves a huge selection of pasta Sun-Tues, for only $5.99, and its a good sized serving.

For $5.99 why cook it at home?

[7jaii]

I can see lawsuits as people keel over salmonella poisoning. Cooking by pouring hot water in a container. Try that with chicken! Pasta? What about the thicker pastas -How come it takes 10-20 Minutes on a stove for al dente but I only need hot water for ANY PASTA (as advertised).

I see stupid people dying over this and lawyers salavating for business :twisted:

[danfromwaterloo]

Here's what I can gather:

The thing is basically a thermos. If you pour boiling water into it, the thermos part of it will retain most of the heat for an extended period of time. During that time, the pasta cooks. I would gamble that it actually does live up to it's claims....now, the taste? Often times, they suggest a lot more water to get rid of the starch from the pasta. With less water, the starch is more concentrated. The noodles will be tougher. Also, can you imagine cleaning this thing? Yikes.

It always amazed me that people actually find cooking such a chore that they're willing to shortcut even the most basic of operations - like the Perfect Donut pourer, or the assorted choppers they have, etc. Just do it by hand.

[dereky]

I can see lawsuits as people keel over salmonella poisoning. Cooking by pouring hot water in a container. Try that with chicken! Pasta? What about the thicker pastas -How come it takes 10-20 Minutes on a stove for al dente but I only need hot water for ANY PASTA (as advertised).

I see stupid people dying over this and lawyers salavating for business :twisted:

Who said anything about chicken? This is for PASTA (maybe vegetables or shrimp, but where did you get chicken?)...who wants to eat boiled chicken anyways?

[FastFokker]

Who said anything about chicken? This is for PASTA (maybe vegetables or shrimp, but where did you get chicken?)...who wants to eat boiled chicken anyways?I think the point was because they claim to be able to cook all kinds of different foods, including sausages, that people might get the bright idea to cook chicken in it (or other foods requiring minimum internal temperatures).

http://www.asseenontv.com/prod-pages/images/PastaPronto-Body-Cut_01.jpg

[The Shirker]

Since no one here seems to have first hand experience, I Googled and found an article in the Chicago Tribune. http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/yourmoney/sns-yourmoney-0312ontv,1,3253059.story?coll=chi-business-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true

The writer says it's not bad for other things (veggies, shrimp) but doesn't work with pasta at all.

The instructions say pasta will cook in 7 to 10 minutes. It does not. Fifteen didn't do the trick, either, not even for thin angel-hair pasta. Worse yet, with each trial, after we pried off the lid and tested a strand, too much precious heat had been lost, and we found ourselves firing up the stove in an effort to save the meal.

Partly cooked noodles have a bit of buoyancy to them. Stick a pound of vermicelli in a cylinder of hot water, and before long, all those vermicelli strands will rise up and poke their heads above the water line. And once they do, they'll stop cooking, yielding a pound of pasta with quarter-inch edges that are hard and stuck together.

But that annoyance is nothing compared to the Pasta Express' disastrous results with small, shaped pasta. I dare you to cook up a box of macaroni without ever once stirring the pot. It's unimaginable, right? But that's the reality with the Pasta Express, in which noodles hibernate in motionless water. The result is a predictable mess: a fused glob of starch that looks like something Richard Dreyfuss would have obsessed over in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."

As for whoever posted about why not just cook it on the stove top, I was thinking this product would be good for the office (if it worked). Just add hot water from the coffee machine and presto - hot lunch. :D

[superizzy]

Stupidest thing i ever heard of

[itsmypostoffice]

Stupidest thing i ever heard of
but it will sell truck-loads because it's an infomercial -- people are too embarassed to return their purchase or the refund/return shipping is too high that it isn't worth the trouble.

my favourite scam are any cleaning wands or gadgets that's buy 1 get 3 free + lifetime supply of replacement towels/cleansers/inks...shipping is $39.99+TAX each month. each month -- holy smokes!

[Steeve Urkel]

but it will sell truck-loads because it's an infomercial -- people are too embarassed to return their purchase or the refund/return shipping is too high that it isn't worth the trouble.

my favourite scam are any cleaning wands or gadgets that's buy 1 get 3 free + lifetime supply of replacement towels/cleansers/inks...shipping is $39.99+TAX each month. each month -- holy smokes!

What cleaning wands are these?

Anyways,
I think if someone were to cook shrimp in there they would surely get food poisoning.
some "smart" american might get the idea to cook a burger or something int here.

As for eating out and having pasta $6 is very expensive considering u can buy a big bag of noodles for $1 and a couple tomatoes for $1 as well and made homemade stuff that is way better and doesn't take too long.

The best informerical scan I have seen is the fabric socks you put on your feet to slide around your floor and exercise!...only $50!!!

[JayTee1]

How do you get poisoned from cooking it like that?

[ninjakun]

this Pasta Express thing is on sale this week at Canadian Tire for $14.99 !

don't think I'll be buying one though. the way it cooks, doesn't it make the pasta taste "plasticky" ? nah, I'll stick with stainless steel pots and pans thank you very much. :lol:

[duckdown]

As for eating out and having pasta $6 is very expensive considering u can buy a big bag of noodles for $1 and a couple tomatoes for $1 as well and made homemade stuff that is way better and doesn't take too long.


Sure, except that pasta sauce is not made with a fresh tomato or two.

It requires CANNED TOMATOES and possibly tomato paste (everyone has their own variation).. Furthermore, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, onions, basil, etc. all add up to another buck or two. Then, you need to simmer it on a stove for at least an hour, and any good italian remembers Mom and Nona (grandma) simmering a home-made sauce ALL day and it aromatizing the entire house... Hours of simmering is energy/electricity spent

Overall, $5.99 is _NOT_ farfetched, and certainly not a bad deal.. East Side Marios would be a BAD deal.

[M-e-X-x]

Not really difficult..but really you use alot more water and energy to heat up the water than necessary.

I actually find it cheaper to go out for pasta than cooking it at home...especially for one person.

We have a place here in Cgy.that serves a huge selection of pasta Sun-Tues, for only $5.99, and its a good sized serving.

For $5.99 why cook it at home?

there's tons of places like that in cgy.. coz there's no night life there so they gotta have these promos to get ppl out haha...

[deep]

Even an incredibly basic understanding of physics should tell you that that thing is not the ideal solution for cooking pasta.

It does not have good heat retention capabilities, there is no way to provide additional heat without dumping and pouring, and because of the shape of it, if you filled it with spaghetti you couldn't add nearly enough water to cook it. Unfortunately, thicker pastas would be even worse, and would almost certainly be uncookable in it.

I'm guessing that you could cook maybe one half serving of angel hair in that thing, and that is all. Piece of garbage.

[Kasakato]

Shopping bags did a test with one of them. The pasta turned out mussy on the outside, uncooked at the core.

[15-20_God]

where does the boiling water come from?

[gordholio]

Yeah, there's no way that pasta sitting in boiling water is going to cook in 7 minutes.
When I cook pasta, I cook it 8 to 10 minutes and the water is on a constant boil.
A friend of my mom's tried one of these products and they said it worked okay.
I would never cook sausages or meat in it though.
To get rid of the starch, just rinse the paste in hot water afterwards.
I don't think I'd buy this thing though, since I don't want any plastic chemicals in my food.

[Tiger3000]

As Seen It On Tv had a display a while back, I touched the pasta, and it was soft, some people were tasting it....I thought that was gross. I'd rather cook pasta the traditional way.

[danfromwaterloo]

As Seen It On Tv had a display a while back, I touched the pasta, and it was soft, some people were tasting it....I thought that was gross. I'd rather cook pasta the traditional way.

But who has the time and money to cook pasta your father's way??!!

You NEED the Pasta Express. It can cook three different types of pasta at once! And it does shrimp....vegetables...and soups quickly and easily!

And cleanup is a snap! Just open the patented Pasta Express ThermoLid, fill with soapy water, and TA-DA! Ready for another use!

You guys should seriously order two or three. Remember that extra one for the cottages, and children away at university!

Just call 1-800-PASTAYUM and give them referral code 11488 and tell them Dan sent you