Hello friends!
I can’t wait to make pasta with you for Valentine’s Day. It’s all very Lady and the Tramp romance, just from afar. I say you pour yourselves a celebratory drink and we’ll all toast to love and pasta together.
Below is the recipe we’ll use for class. It’s a great idea to have your ingredients measured out so we can make pasta at the same rate. We’ll take it easy though, don’t feel stressed.
There are a few special tools you’ll want for class.
I’ll be using a hand crank pasta roller to roll sheets of pasta and then cut them into fettuccini noodles. Maybe this is your opportunity to dust off your Kitchen Aid pasta attachment. I fully support it! Just make sure you have the sheeter and noodle slicer as well. If you’d really like to go for it, you may want to play with a ravioli stamp or hand-shaped pasta board though I won’t be instructing through those tools.
We’ll be making pasta using flour, eggs, and salt. With so few ingredients, we want them all to be high quality. I’ve experimented with pasta and found the best texture comes from a mix of 00 Flour and Semonila Flour. I suggest you use these flours along with me but if that’s not in the cards for you, all-purpose flour will work too!
Pasta sauce is such a personal preference that I want you to make what you like. I love this Pasta al Limone from The Kitchn, these Turkey Meatballs, or maybe you’d like a pot of Marcella Hazan’s tomato sauce bubbling away on the stovetop. Whatever you decide to enjoy with your fresh pasta, splurge on the good butter and the Italian Parmesan because… geez, we’re making pasta with our very own hands.
We’ll see you Friday the 12th for fresh pasta! I can’t wait! xo
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BAKEAWAY LIVE: Valentine’s Fresh Pasta Night!
- Prep Time: 45 minutes
- Cook Time: 3 minutes
- Total Time: 48 minutes
- Yield: 2 generous servings 1x
Ingredients
- 9 ounces (about 2 cups and 2 tablespoons) 00 flour
- 1 ounce (about 3 tablespoons) semonila flour, plus more for rolling
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 large eggs
- 4 large egg yolks
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
Instructions
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, semolina and salt with a fork.
Create a deep well in the middle of the flour and crack the eggs and egg yolks into this well. Add the olive oil and whisk the eggs with the fork to break the yolks and combine.
As you whisk the eggs, begin gradually pulling in flour from the bottom and sides of the bowl. Don’t rush this step. At first, the eggs will start to look like a slurry and slightly lumpy. Once enough flour has been added, it will start forming a very soft dough and become harder to whisk with a fork. Don’t worry if you haven’t used all the flour.
Turn the dough and any excess flour out onto a clean counter. Begin gently folding the dough on itself, flattening, and folding again. It will be extremely soft at first, then gradually start to firm up. Clean your hands of sticky dough and add a bit more flour to the dough as your knead. Once it’s firm enough to knead, begin kneading the dough. Incorporate more flour as needed to prevent the dough from sticking to you or the counter. Slice into the dough with a paring knife; if you see lots of air bubbles, keep kneading. The dough is kneaded when it forms a smooth elastic ball and has very few air bubbles when sliced.
Clean and dry the mixing bowl. Place the ball of dough inside and cover with a dinner plate or plastic wrap. Rest for at least 30 minutes to allow the flour to hydrate and the gluten to relax.
*At this point, the pasta dough can be refrigerated for up to 24 hours. Let it come back to room temperature before rolling.
Sprinkle a baking sheet generously with semolina flour and place the ball of dough on top (it will stick to the bowl; use a spatula or bowl scraper if necessary). Divide the dough into four equal portions. Dust the portions with flour and cover with a clean dishtowel. Going forward, keep everything well-floured to prevent the pasta from sticking to itself or the pasta roller.
Set your pasta machine to the thickest setting (usually marked “1”). Flatten one piece of dough into a thick disk between your hands and feed it through the pasta roller. Repeat once or twice. Fold this piece of dough into thirds, like folding a letter, and press it between your hands again. With the pasta machine still on the widest setting, feed the pasta crosswise between the rollers. Feed it through once or twice more until smooth. If desired, repeat this folding step. This helps to strengthen the gluten in the flour, giving it a chewier texture when cooked.
Begin changing the settings on your roller to roll the pasta thinner and thinner. Roll the pasta two or three times at each setting, and don’t skip settings (the pasta tends to snag and warp if you do). If the pasta gets too long to be manageable, lay it on a cutting board and slice it in half. Roll the pasta as thin as you like to go. For linguine and fettuccine, I normally go to 6 or 7 on the KitchenAid attachement; for angel hair or stuffed pastas, I go one or two settings thinner.
Cut the long stretch of dough into noodle-length sheets, usually about 12-inches. If making filled pasta or lasagna, proceed with shaping. If cutting into noodles, switch from the pasta roller to the noodle cutter, and run the sheet of pasta through the cutter. Toss the noodles with a little flour to keep them from sticking and gather them into a loose basket. Set this basket on the floured baking sheet and cover with a towel while you finish rolling and cutting the rest of the dough.
To cook the pasta immediately, bring a large pot of water to a boil, salt the water, and cook the pasta until al dente, 4-5 minutes. To dry, lay the pasta over a clothes drying rack, coat hangers, or the back of a chair, and let air dry until completely brittle. Store in an airtight container for several weeks. To freeze, either freeze flat in long noodles or in the basket-shape on a baking sheet until completely frozen. Gather into an airtight container and freeze for up to three months. Dried and frozen noodles may need an extra minute or two to cook.
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