How much do you love pasta and how often would you like to enjoy gluten-free low-carb pasta (pasta with zero carbs)?
Handmade noodles, spaghetti, lasagna & spaetzle low-carb & gluten-free
What types of pasta do you prefer?
The answers to these questions will help you decide what kind of pasta preparation technique best suits your needs. Our Pasta Magic (ready mix for zero carb pasta) allows you to make a large number of different pasta, however, you’d sometimes need specific tools that might not yet be part of your kitchen equipment.
Here you’ll find an overview of different techniques how to make your own pasta plus our buy recommendations for utensils and appliances already tested by us.
CONTENTS
- Short glossary of pasta makers
- Basics: rolling pin and bamboo fiber
- Pasta rollers with hand crank, with motor set or as attachment for food processors
- Extruder attachments for food processors
- Fully automatic extruder pasta makers (our recommendation)
- Spaetzle makers
- Combining different gadgets
- Drying the pasta – yes or no?
Short glossary of pasta makers to make your own no-carb noodles:
- Pasta extruder: a machine that directly pushes the pasta shapes out (penne, spaghetti, tagliatelle), that means, it ‘extrudes’ your pasta.
- Pasta roller: a machine that requires you to run the pasta dough through the roller so that you get thin sheets (this step has to be done multiple times) and, finally, (after attaching a cutter set) the sheets are cut into the shape you prefer e.g. tagliatelle. A pasta roller is the next jump up in quality and makes it easier for you to roll out the pasta dough, without a dead-tired arm.
- Extruding dies: discs for pasta extruders that define the shape of your pasta as desired, e. g. many small holes for spaghetti, rings for penne or maccaroni, twisted stars for fusilli and so on.
Basics: rolling pin and bamboo fiber to make your own zero-carb pasta
Budget: € 0 – 20 (depending on whether you already have bamboo fiber and a rolling pin in your kitchen)
For starters and waverers
Types of pasta: tagliatelle, lasagna, tortellini, ravioli
For those considering making their own no-carb pasta and just want to give it a first try, a rolling pin (you can also use a can or a cylindrical bottle) and one pack of bamboo fiber will perfectly do to enter pasta paradise. Here’s how it works to make your own tagliatelle and lasagna sheets…
Pasta rollers with hand crank, with motor set or as attachment for food processors to make your own zero-carb pasta
Budget: € 20 – 120
For all lovers of ‘old-school’ pasta making, takes rolling the dough to the next level
Types of pasta: tagliatelle, lasagna, tortellini, ravioli, spaghetti (depending on model)
If you consider the amount of work needed to make pasta dough once by hand and once with the aid of a fully automatic pasta maker, the use of a pasta roller is sort of in-between. However, only little time is saved compared to rolling the dough by hand, and this is clearly not an option if you just want to ‘quickly’ make a pasta dish. Nevertheless, making zero-carb pasta with a pasta roller is definitely fun and produces amazingly nice results for some very specific pasta shapes.
Pasta rollers are available both as independent appliances, hand-cranked or motorized, and as attachment for food processors.
However, food processor attachments usually offer a more limited selection of pasta shapes.
By the way, no matter what kind of pasta roller you choose, you’ll always need our bamboo fiber for dusting the dough – but 1 pack is easily enough for making 20 pasta dishes.
Click here to watch a video tutorial about pasta rollers … (German)
We have carefully tested the pasta maker Atlas 150 by the Italian company Marcato and we were really convinced by the high quality of the machine. The pasta maker is very well built, easy to clean and comes with a variety of accessories.
Compared to other machines (similar in design), it’s slightly more pricey (especially when choosing the motorized model), but it’s definitely going to be worth the money. We also tested two machines that only cost about 30 euros, but had to find out that they were more or less a ’cheap’ copy of the Marcato model – we already recognized huge differences in workmanship and quality when unpacking the machines. In addition, most of the cheaper machines only offer a very small selection of attachments, so that you won’t have any possibilities to upgrade your machine later on.
Those who want to make tagliatelle or lasagna only every now and then, should better save the 30 euros and the storage space in the kitchen cabinet and simply roll out the dough by hand.
Extruder attachments food processors to make your own no–carb pasta
Budget: € 40 – 200 
For those who already have a food processor, but don’t want any additional appliance on the counter
Types of pasta: depends on the food processor model, in general, they come with at least one attachment to make spaghetti and one to make small-size pasta (e.g. penne)
Many food processors now offer special attachments to extrude the pasta dough (usually a combination of mincer and shaper). A total different matter are roller attachments: you first push the dough through rollers, then you cut the dough sheets into shape after attaching a specific cutter set (see above). Extruder attachments save significantly more time compared to roller attachments as the dough is directly pushed out in the desired pasta shape.
To make your own pasta with no carbs, you mix the dough in a bowl first, then you push it through the extruder attachment (similar to a mincer attachment).
Gather information before making a purchase decision, check out what kind of different extruding dies (pasta shapers) are on offer for the specific attachments and what it will cost you to buy them all including attachment, as desired.
Many extruder attachments are sold at such a very high price that it would not be vastly more expensive to simply buy a fully automatic pasta extruder.
Fully automatic pasta extruders (our recommendation!) to make your own zero-carb pasta
Budget: € 120 – 200
For pastaholics who like it fast and simple
Types of pasta: ANY shapes for which you’ll find an extruding die
If you love good pasta and don’t want to spend all your time slaving away in the kitchen, you just can’t get around a fully automatic pasta extruder! Firstly, the desired pasta shapes are directly pushed out and secondly, the machine mixes and kneads the dough automatically.
Compared to a food processor attachment with extruder, you won’t need to constantly ‘feed’ the dough through the attachment. The baking mix to make your own no-carb pasta is directly thrown into the machine, pour with water, and then you’ll just have to wait a few minutes until the first noodles or spaghetti come out of the machine – you’d only have to cut the pasta into strips of the desired length afterwards. 
Those who work really fast can even make a low-carb rice substitute using the extra thick spaghetti shaping discs (shown on the right in the picture) and a thin spatula!
We carried out all of our pasta experiments with the Philips pasta maker HR2355/12 and were pleasantly surprised: the machine 1. is significantly more compact than we had expected, 2. produced really good results and 3. is surprisingly easy to clean.
The pasta maker now comes with a new model in black color with auto-weighing function. However, as this function is only set to weigh the amount of water needed for wheat doughs, it has no real added value for us, in fact, it would rather make the menu guide unnecessarily complicated. In addition, as the machine would no longer work properly if the sensitive auto-weighing function gets broken, we really do not recommend this model, at least, if you wish to use our Pasta Magic mix. The older model HR2355/1 of the Philips pasta maker is nearly identical in design, simply works wonderfully and is easy to use. Clear buy recommendation!
And if all these 9 different extruding dies for the Philips pasta maker are not enough for you, you can even get additional 20 different shapers (so-called screens) using a special adapter (see photo) from the Italian company Pastidea. The products are partly and/or occasionally available at Amazon, but tend to be sold out very quickly there. We have already bought many shapers directly from the company’s online shop and have always been very satisfied with the quality.
We haven’t yet tested any fully automatic pasta makers by other manfuacturers. Doubtlessly, there are some around which might produce good results as well. However, you should consider that there is not too much to expect from an appliance that is priced at under 100 euros. Extruding the pasta requires very high pressure, that means, you’ll need a powerful motor, a strong housing and sturdy design.
Spaetzle maker
Budget: € 25 – 60
For spaetzle lovers
Pasta types: spaetzle, knoepfle (spaetzle droplets)
Well, there’s little to say in this respect. If you want to make spaetzle with the Pasta Magic mix, you’ll need a spaetzle maker – and done. The dough would probably turn out to be a bit too thick for scraping it off a wooden cutting board, however, it is up to you to add more water or eggs, which makes the batter more liquid, but it may lead to a different result, though. Here, the taste of local spaetzle dishes varies greatly from place to place and we advise you to check out the perfect preparation method for yourself. This is the method (german version) we liked best for making our spaetzle using a spaetzle maker from Westmark:
The gadgets are of good workmanship and also easy to clean in the dishwasher thanks to their removable handle.
Combining different gadgets to make zero-carb pasta
Budget: the sky’s the limit
For absolute pastaholics who sometimes love it quick and easy, and other times prefer the old-fashioned way, but always perfect
Types of pasta: ANY
Meanwhile, our kitchen is well equipped with every single appliance and tool we mentioned before to make every pasta shape imaginable, and we have discovered that almost every item has a justified existence. Tube-shaped noodles such as penne will only work with a pasta extruder and also spaghetti (although it would also be possible to make them with a roller and the appropriate attachment) can be made much quicker and turn out more beautiful with the aid of an extruder.
On the other hand, tagliatelle will turn out slightly ’more perfect’ when using a pasta roller, simply because with most of the shaping discs available for pasta extruders, the pasta will come out a bit too thick. But a good solution would be to buy an alternative shaper with adapter for your pasta extruder (e.g. from Pastidea). You can also make lasagna sheets with the extruder, though not as thin and ’pretty’ as they would come out with a pasta roller.
After all, you should get clear on what kind of pasta shapes you prefer and what kind of dish you are trying to achieve before buying an appliance and, above all, how much time you can invest or would like to invest to prepare your pasta. For those who only have very little time left in the daily hectic rush between family life and work life, the fully automatic extruder pasta maker à la Philips is the best choice anyway. Once assembled, this appliance produces kilos and kilos of fresh pasta in the most different shapes (by the way, changing the shaping discs during preparation is a snap).
The freshly made pasta can be frozen in portions and is simply thrown in boiling water when needed – this way, you’ll be able to conjure up a delicious pasta dish in no time as the cooking time of fresh yet frozen pasta is always much shorter than of store-bought dried noodles!
Drying your pasta – YES or NO?
There’s one good reason why fresh pasta simply tastes better than dried noodles from the bag: you won’t be able to dry your pasta without sacrificing both taste and consistency. Even if you minimize this disadvantage a bit and allow the pasta to gently air-dry – however, you’ll always notice a significant difference to freshly made pasta. We therefore strongly recommend NOT to dry the pasta yourself, but either enjoy it fresh, put it in a bag and store in the fridge for no more than 2 days, or just freeze if stored for a longer period.