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3D Printers Making Inroads In Kitchens
mpicpp sends an article from Fortune about the tiny industry springing up around food-related 3D printing. While such devices are still too expensive and too special-purpose for home kitchens, professionals in restaurants and large cafeterias are figuring out ways they can automate certain time-intensive tasks. For example, pasta: "If the user is making a recipe for ravioli, for instance, the [device] prints the bottom layer of dough, the filling and the top dough layer in subsequent steps. It reduces a lengthy recipe to two minutes construction time and ensures that no one has to clean a countertop caked with leftover dough and flour." The companies developing these 3D printers hope they'll be this generation's version of the microwave, gradually finding a use in almost every kitchen.
Instead of having to clean a counter top, you only have to clean various hoppers and extruders, and the build plate. And all the prep tools and bowls. And you'll also have to program in all the steps. and it will only print one at a time.
It's so much easier than that 'old fashioned' way!
Obviously you've never made ravioli by hand. I have, and it's not the most fun thing to do. That's why I typically make a lot of them when I do, so I can freeze a bunch and thaw them out as needed.
A lot of that stuff will need to be cleaned anyhow. Rolling pasta dough is not the easiest thing to get perfect either. Then if you put too much filling in, you can't get the edges to press together and hold when you cook them.
I'm not sure how you think you make them by hand, but you can only put one together at a time that way too.