Pasta Making

On Saturday morning, we were cleaning up around the house. I was watching Martha (Martha Stewart's new show) like a good little minion and Jamie Oliver was on (I had it recorded, obviously) and he and Martha made an EXCELLENT looking pasta dish (listed below). Matt and I had already planned a meal for that evening, but we quickly stuck the chicken in the freezer and said, “We're making that.” Matt ran by the store on his way home from Home Depot and we invited some good friends over who wouldn't care if we messed up a new recipe and had to order pizza.

Matt and I made up the pasta dough as suggested by Jamie, but it didn't come out very well, so I suggested we call my dad and get the recipe he uses for homemade pasta. So we did and it turned out beautifully. We used the pasta roller attachment to our kitchenaid mixer to make lovely homemade pasta. It was really really easy and I know we'll be doing it again soon.We made the pasta dough by putting 3/4 cup of flour in our food processor with an egg. Then we got it going and added water a tablespoon at a time until it created a nice little ball. When you take it out, it should be a nice doughy consistency and not stick to your hands. If it does, you should add more flour. If it doesn't make a cohesive ball easily, you should add a bit more water.

You have to divide the dough into about three parts once you make hte ball to get it in small enough batches to run through the roller. Then you run it through your pasta roller on a thick setting and slowly make the rollers closer together and get it nice and thin. Then you lay out your thin rolls and get all of them ready. The next step is to switch to the cutter. If you're making TONS (more than 2 or 3 batches of pasta) you'll have to lay them out and let them dry … My great grandma (or so I'm told) used clean towels on beds and the backs of chairs for hers. When we made them, we only had a bit to do, so we got a pot of boiling water ready and as we cut each batch, we tossed it in the water. Our friends helped and Mikey, who's a bit Italian (and knows some of the cooking methods), showed us some good tricks with it, like letting each strand of pasta fall in the pot on its own so they don't stick together. It was really helpful to have lots of hands in this for the making AND the cleaning.

I encourage you to try it! There are lots of pasta rollers that are way cheaper than the one that we have for our KitchenAid mixer. It's really a rewarding activity and you can even make different types of pasta, like spinach and whole wheat and sun-dried tomato. They have one on Amazon that's hand cranked for $17!