Homemade Pasta from Scratch!

Andrew with Some Freshly Smoothed Pasta Dough

Last night we made a simple vegetable broth and a phenomenal winter squash risotto. Both recipes came from the cookbook, Mediterranean Harvest. The recipes were so good that we decided to dive in again and try some more tonight. The first was a recipe for pasta dough. For Christmas, my parents gave us a pasta maker which is awesome! We have been really interested in making our own pasta for a while, so this made it even more possible. When I saw the recipe for pasta dough in the cookbook we received from Andrew’s parents, it was as if the starts aligned :0). Below is the recipe we used for the pasta dough. We altered it slightly from the recipe in the cookbook, but the results were fantastic. As we “speak” the fettuccine is drying on the pasta drying rack in our kitchen. I can’t wait to try this batch out and start making some more unique recipes!

Pasta Dough Ingredients

Ingredients:
3 scant cups unbleached all-purpose flour (we used 1.5 cups of flour and 1.5 cups of semolina flour)
3/4 teaspoon salt (We used freshly ground sea salt from my brother!)
3 large eggs
2-3 tablespoons water (We used 3)

Steps:
1. Place the flour and salt in a food processor fitted with the steel blade, and pulse a few times to combine. Although we have a food processor, we didn’t use one. We simply mixed the flours and salt in a large bowl.

2. Add the eggs and 2 tablespoons and process until dough comes together in a ball. If it seems dry, add another tablespoon of after. Again, we stirred by hand and ended up needing to add 1 additional tablespoon of water.

Part I of Step 2

Part II Step 2

3. Transfer the dough to a lightly floured work surface. Knead by hand for a few minutes, until you have a smooth ball. Wrap in plasatic and let rest on the counter for 30 minutes to an hour. We let our dough sit for about 35 minutes.

Pasta Dough in a Ball

4. After the allotted sitting time, cut the dough into 4 equal pieces. While working with one piece, keep the other 3 pieces covered with the plastic wrap. Set the rollers at the widest opening, flatten the piece of dough so that its width will fit inside the pasta machine roller. Run the piece of dough through the machine at the widest opening.

One Quarter of Pasta Dough

5. If the pasta is too sticky, dust with flour. Change the pasta machine opening to a smaller opening and run the flattened pasta dough through the machine.

Running Pasta Dough Through Machine

6. Continue to run the pasta through the pasta machine at a decreasing width rate until desired thickness.

Threading Pasta Dough Through the Machine

7. Choose your desired pasta cut (a standard machine does regular pasta and fettuccine). Place the handle into the appropriate cutter slot and run your thinned and smoothed piece of pasta dough (from Step #6) through the cutter. If it doesn’t cut, the dough is too sticky and needs to have some flour added to it. It’s important to note that having two people to work the pasta machine seemed to be extremely helpful.

Fettuccine Coming Out of the Machine

8. Immediately hang your pasta on the drying rack and make sure to separate each noodle so that the dough does not stick together. Repeat Steps 4-8 for the remaining three pieces of pasta dough.