Fresh Pasta
(from 226-2tone’s recipe box)
Total Time: 45 minutes
Preparation Time: 0 minutes
Active Cooking Time: 30 minutes
Yield: 1 pound fresh pasta
Make Ahead: Pasta can be kept at room temperature for several hours
Difficulty: Intermediate
Fresh pasta is surprisingly easy to make at home. Yes, you will need a hand-cranked pasta machine, but the ingredient list could not be shorter (just eggs and flour) and the results are much better than anything you can buy.
You will be making 1 pound of Fresh Egg Pasta. We will be cutting the pasta into fettuccine that you should use for the Fettuccine Alfredo recipe in this lesson.
While we suggest using a pasta machine to cut fettuccine, you can cut fresh sheets of pasta by hand. Simply fold each sheet crosswise into thirds or quarters. Use a sharp chef’s knife and cut perpendicular to folds to form noodles of desired width. This technique comes in handy when you want to make wider shapes, like pappardelle or tagliatelle.
Here are the guidelines for cutting fresh by hand:
Pappardelle: 3/4 to 1 inch wide
Tagliatelle: 1/4 to 3/8 inch wide
Fettuccine: 1/8 to 1/4 inch wide
- We like Italian-made hand-operated manual pasta machines. We’ve tested the Imperia and Atlas pasta machines—the two major brands in Italy and widely available in cookware shops around the world—and found them equally good.
Source: America's Test Kitchen Cooking School (from RecipeThing user Bethany)
Categories: Pasta
Ingredients
- 2 Cups (10 ounces) all-purpose flour
- 3 Large eggs
Directions
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Make Dough – 1. Pulse 2 cups flour in food processor to aerate and break up clumps so that flour evenly absorbs eggs. 2. Add 3 eggs and process until rough dough forms, about 30 seconds. 3. If dough resembles small pebbles, dough is too dry; add water, 1/2 teaspoon at a time and process until dough forms rough ball. 4. If dough sticks to sides of workbowl, dough is too wet; add flour, 1 tablespoon at a time and process until dough forms rough ball. 5. Turn dough ball and small bits out onto dry work surface. 6. Knead by hand until dough is smooth, elastic, and homogenous, 1 to 2 minutes. 7. Cover dough with plastic wrap and set aside for at least 15 minutes and up to 2 hours to allow gluten to relax so that dough rolls out easily.
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Roll Dough – 8. Cut about one-sixth of dough from ball and flatten it into disk. 9. Re-cover remaining dough with plastic wrap to prevent it from drying out. 10. Run disk through rollers of pasta machine set to widest position. 11. Bring ends of dough toward middle and press down to seal. 12. Feed open side of pasta through rollers. 13. Fold and roll dough once more. 14. If dough is at all sticky, lightly dust it with flour. 15. Without folding again, run pasta through widest setting twice or until dough is smooth. 16. Roll pasta thinner by putting it through machine repeatedly, narrowing setting each time. Roll until dough is thin and satiny. 17. After dough is rolled through narrowest setting, you should be able to see outline of your hand through pasta. 18. Lay sheet of pasta on clean kitchen towel and cover it with damp cloth to keep it from drying out. 19. Repeat with other pieces of dough.
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Cut Dough – 20. To cut pasta sheets into fettuccine, affix cutting attachment. 21. Run each sheet through pasta machine. 22. Spread strands out on rimmed baking sheet, separating individual strands as best as you can. 23. Cover with slightly damp kitchen towel to prevent pasta from drying out too much.