I've dreamt of moving to Italy and becoming an apprentice to an old lady who spoke only Italian. I'd eat only pasta and pizza and meats and cheeses and I'd come back a balloon, but a happy balloon. I haven't made it to Italy yet, but I thought I'd give making homemade pasta the old college try.
Do you have flour in your cupboard? An egg? Water? You're set! Let's go make some pasta!
"Life is too short not to have pasta, steak, and butter.”
― Iman
my hand-shaped pasta using sushi rollers
FIrst off, you may be asking yourself, why in the world would I go through the trouble of making my own pasta when I have boxes of it in my pantry ready to go? One thing you should know is that Italians are so obsessed with pasta, rightly so, that they've created different shaped pastas to hold different types of sauces. You can read about pasta/sauce pairings here on BBC.
Homemade pasta is slightly more delicate than the dried kind, but it lends itself to more delicate sauces. Honestly though, if you put any homemade pasta and any homemade sauce together, it's probably going to taste pretty damn delicious.
The Recipe
1 egg
1 yolk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup/125g all-purpose flour
1-2 tablespoons water
The Method
I like to mix on a cutting board or on the counter top, but others like using a bowl. Take your pick and run with it!
First, mix your flour and salt. I've tried using self-raising gluten-free flour as a replacement (for my boyfriend), and it's worked pretty well. I'll keep exploring my options for my gluten-intolerant friends out there.
Next, make a little well in the flour and add your egg and water and mix. It should create a stiff dough. Add a teaspoon of water at a time if your mix is still crumbly.
Once you're done, wrap your dough up in saran wrap and let it rest for an hour.
my hand-shaped pasta shaped on chopsticks
Shaping It
So you can use a wine bottle, or a rolling pin, a pasta machine, or your hands and random things around the kitchen. You can see my more traditional spaghetti and linguini up at the top of the page on my Los Angeles-shaped cutting board. Here you can see some funny shaped pasta here, of which was inspired by @miyukiadachi that makes the most unique pasta shapes.
Who knew there were so many other uses for cheese graters, sushi rollers, and chopsticks?
photo by Christine Siracusa
The Cooking
Fresh pasta doesn't take as much time to cook since the moisture is still locked into the little guys. Once you throw it into your pot with salted boiling water get ready to catch the ones that float to the top telling you that they're ready to go. Now you're ready to throw your beautiful pasta into some tasty sauce. I'd be sad to hear you went through all that trouble just to throw some Ragu on it, so please, please, please find a sauce recipe to live up to your work on the pasta. We love a good bolognese. Buon appetito!
