PASTA
Pasta - one of the most beautiful and elegant dishes you can make in your kitchen. Learn how to make pasta from scratch, by hand, as well as two ways to utilize the fettuccine: aglio e olio and cacio e pepe.
Equipment List
Rolling pin OR pasta press
Stainless steel pan
Cheese grater
Bench scraper
Shopping List
Flour
Semolina flour
Eggs
Olive oil
Romano
Parmigiano reggiano
Garlic
Parsley
Lemon
Salt
Black pepper
Butter
Method: Pasta
Handmade Fettuccine
Start by making a mound of flour on your countertop with a well in the middle of that you can crack two or three eggs in.
Followed by a little drizzle of olive oil (optional), and a pinch of salt.
Grab a fork and beat/whisk the eggs picking up a little flour with every stroke of the fork.
Once it becomes too sticky grab a bench scraper and start folding everything towards the center.
Once a shaggy dough starts to form begin to knead the dough by hand for a solid ten minutes. Knead until sore, or when the dough has the consistency of play dough.
Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and let sit in room temperature for at least thirty minutes. This lets the gluten relax a little bit before rolling it out.
After thirty minutes, unwrap the dough and start flouring everything - your hands, the dough, the rolling pin, the countertop, and anything else you think needs flouring around you.
Once finished flouring, cut the dough down the center into two halves.
Now it’s time to start gently rolling/laminating it out. Roll like you would be using a pasta machine by rolling it out followed by folding into thirds, turn it 90 degrees and then rolling out again. Do this 3 times total before going for the big time roll. Roll until you can almost see your hand through it.
Once you have the dough rolled out to size and thickness it is time to cut. Start by cutting off the edges to give you an even rectangle. From here you can make lasagna noodles, or filled pasta like tortellini or ravioli.
For simple pasta, loosely fold the dough cutting it into nice wide fettuccine pieces. Once finished cutting, unfold all of the pieces to make sure none of them are stuck together.
Once all of the noodles are unwound, lift up the noodles and toss them with a little bit of flour to make sure they don’t stick together. Make sure each individual strand is coated with floured.
Hang to dry or placed under plastic wrap until ready to use.
Enjoy!
Semolina Pasta
Start by mixing half all-purpose flour, half semolina flour and then dumping the flour onto the countertop.
Make a mound of the two flours with a crater in the center and dumping two eggs into the center with a little bit of olive oil.
Grab a fork and beat the eggs picking up a little flour with every stroke of the fork.
Once it becomes too sticky grab a bench scraper and start folding everything towards the center.
Once a shaggy dough starts to form begin to knead the dough by hand for a solid ten minutes. Knead until sore, or when the dough has the consistency of play dough.
Wrap the dough TIGHTLY in plastic wrap and let sit in room temperature for at least thirty minutes.
After thirty minutes, unwrap the dough and start flouring everything - your hands, the dough, the rolling pin, the countertop, and anything else you think needs flouring around you.
Once finished flouring, cut the dough down the center into two halves.
At least laminate the dough before running through the pasta machine.
With the pasta machine on its widest setting it’s time to start running it through.
This machine’s widest setting is a 7 and we want to get it down to a 2, so this means running it through at least 4 to 5 times.
This means that the dough will start to get a little long, so I recommend cutting it into two pieces and work those individually.
Once the dough has been rolled/thinned down to a 2, dust your dough with some flour before running through the pasta machine and making some linguini.
Make sure that they noodles do not stick to each other after running through the blades, and then toss your noodles with some more flour to ensure no sticking.
Place and keep under a plastic wrap, or a ziploc bag and frozen until you are ready to use.
Enjoy!
Cooking the Pasta
Place the noodles into salted boiling water for no more than 90 seconds. Best known when done by tasting!
Cacio e Pepe
Start by grading equal parts of parmesan (or parmigiano reggiano) and romano cheese.
Melt a tbsp of butter (not in actual cacio e pepe) and toast freshly ground pepper by sprinkling some on top.
Add the cooked pasta. Try timing the addition of the pasta when you see a foaming of the butter.
Add both of the graded cheeses to melt and had a solid half cup of pasta water and stir/mix.
Toss/mix until all of the cheeses has melted into the pasta followed by adding salt and pepper and tasting.
Once plated, sprinkle a little more pepper on top to give it the pepe in cacio e pepe.
Enjoy!
Aglio e Olio
Start by slicing a few cloves of garlic followed by roughly chopped parsley.
Heat the garlic in olive oil at a low heat just enough to get a few bubbles going and see the garlic show a little blonde.
Immediately add the pasta noodles once the garlic shows some blonde and using tongs to get some of that pasta water.
Once the pasta has been added, add the chopped parsley, the juice of a squeezed lemon, freshly ground pepper and a pinch of kosher salt. Season to taste.
To get the sauce to really come together toss the pasta to help emulsify the sauce.
Plate and enjoy!