Handmade Pasta: From Flour to Fork

Homemade pasta elevates meals from ordinary to extraordinary. With just flour, eggs, and practice, you can create silky noodles that surpass any dried pasta in texture and flavor.

The classic egg pasta dough uses a simple ratio: one hundred grams of tipo 00 flour per large egg. Mound flour on a clean surface, create a well in the center, crack eggs inside, and gradually incorporate flour into eggs using a fork. Once a shaggy dough forms, knead for eight to ten minutes until smooth and elastic. Rest the dough for thirty minutes minimum, allowing gluten to relax for easier rolling.

Rolling pasta requires patience and progressive thinning. Start at the widest setting on your pasta machine, passing the dough through twice. Reduce the setting by one notch and repeat. Continue until reaching desired thickness – setting five or six for fettuccine, thinner for filled pastas. Hand rolling with a long pin works too but requires more practice.

Shaping offers endless creativity. Fettuccine and pappardelle need only folding and cutting. Ravioli and tortellini wrap around fillings of ricotta, meat, or vegetables. Orecchiette, shaped by pressing and dragging small dough pieces with your thumb, requires no equipment at all.

Cooking fresh pasta differs significantly from dried. Fresh pasta cooks in two to four minutes – dramatically less than dried. The water should boil vigorously and be well-salted. Test frequently as overcooking turns fresh pasta mushy quickly.

Sauce pairing matters. Delicate fresh pasta pairs with lighter sauces – butter and sage, light cream, or simple tomato. Robust dried pasta handles hearty meat sauces and heavy preparations better. Match pasta shape to sauce – wide noodles with rich sauces, thin strands with lighter preparations.

Fresh pasta freezes excellently. Arrange shaped pasta in single layers on parchment-lined trays, freeze until solid, then transfer to bags. Cook directly from frozen, adding a minute to cooking time. This makes batch preparation practical for weeknight meals.