A device to mix and extrude various ingredients including pastas, pastries, baked goods, hors d'oeuvres, and cookies. The device includes novel measuring, mixing and extrusion arrangements including: an automatic measuring cup; a way to continuously mix and extrude ingredients without intervening cleanings; a mixing and extrusion feed for handling different consistencies of ingredients; an integrated automatic cutter; motor cooling and extruded ingredient drying; as well as various safety devices.

A noodle machine has a housing with an upper opening, a receptacle deposited in the housing for receiving flour and water for making dough for noodles by stirring them by rotation of a stirring shaft positioned horizontally in the receptacle and rotated by a motor. A front cap with a center cylindrical portion for a screw portion of the stirring shaft fits therein to squeeze out dough to go out through a sieve with holes fixed at the front of the cylindrical portion to become noodles. And a shutter hangs at a notch at an upper side edge of the receptacle for closing an opening of a U-shaped plate of the front cap for hampering dough from moving into the screw portion and removed to let dough move through the opening of the U-shaped plate to be squeezed out of the sieve to become noodles by rotation of the screw portion.

A method and apparatus adapt a beater/whipper unit to be used in food processor bowls of varying diameter which have upstanding side walls wherein a revolving head of the beater/whipper unit is mountable on an upstanding central well of each working bowl. The revolving head carries a pair of closely spaced counter-rotating beaters which extend downwardly from the revolving head toward the bottom of the bowl so that the beaters are revolved around the central well by the revolving head. A deflector blade having an inclined front surface is detachably mounted on the revolving head when the beater unit is intended to be used on a working bowl having an upstanding side wall of a first predetermined large diameter. The deflector blade is inclined radially inwardly with respect to the direction of travel of the revolving head for deflecting ingredients in the bowl inward from the side wall toward the counter-rotating beaters. When the beater/whipper unit is intended to be used on a working bowl of smaller diameter, the deflector blade of the beater/whipper unit is removed and replaced with shorter counter-rotating beaters having larger diameters which thereby extend near to and are thereby revolved near the smaller diameter upstanding side wall of the smaller diameter bowl without any intervening deflector blade, thereby adapting the same beater/whipper unit to be used in food processors having different diameter bowls.

An improved pasta maker (20) is provided having an upper mixing chamber (130), lower extrusion chamber (132), and a communicating passageway (157) therebetween. The mixing chamber (130) is an open top vessel, and the extrusion chamber (132) presents an outlet (148) adapted to receive a pasta forming die (188). The pasta maker (20) also includes an apertured slide valve plate (26), a powered, rotatable mixing element (170) within the mixing chamber (130) for mixing of the ingredients therein, and a powered, axially rotatable auger (174) within the extrusion chamber (132) for conveying the ingredients towards and through the die (188). The valve plate (26) is removably and shiftably mounted within the passageway (157) for selective movement between a first mixing position blocking communication between the chambers (130, 132), a second feeding position wherein the plate aperture (214) is in registry with openings (136, 150) for communicating the chambers (130, 132), and a third cleaning position wherein the plate (26) is detached from the passageway (157). In the second position, the valve plate (26) is restrained from outward movement towards the third position by interengagement of a pair of laterally spaced, upstanding nibs (220) formed on the plate (26) and the inner surface of sidewall (34) of the machine, and restrained from inward movement towards the first position by the mixing element (170), upon the rotation of the same and when mixed pasta making ingredients are in the mixing chamber (130), urging the plate (26) outwardly.

An enzymatically treated pasta dough having superior workability and machinability is provided by is prepared by treating pasta dough with an enzyme system consisting essentially of one or more pentosanase enzymes which are essentially free of both proteolytic and amylase activities. The enzymatically treated pasta dough has significantly reduced viscosity as compared to a similar pasta dough which has not been enzymatically treated by the process of this invention. The reduced viscosity of the pasta dough allows significantly reduced head pressures and/or significantly higher throughputs in commercial pasta extrusion systems. Additionally, the pasta product obtained using the present enzymatically treated pasta dough is less prone to checking during drying, thereby allowing faster drying times, more even drying, and reduced energy consumption without sacrificing product quality in commercial operations. Additionally, the enzymatically treated pasta dough has sufficient workability that it can be used in a hand-held and hand-operated extrusion system which allows a consumer to prepare the actual pasta product in the home kitchen. A kit including such a hand-held and hand-operated extrusion system is also provided.