daisydaze - 18/04/2008 10:19
I really am keen to have a go at making my own pasta. Can anyone recommend a good pasta machine? And any tried and tested tips would be much appreciated... Thanks!
Pasta machines
Posts
nemorino - 19/04/2008 12:39
Buon giorno a tutti!
Daisydaze, you must have a go at making your own pasta. It's real fun.
It's also very easy to get great results quickly, and while dried pasta is most definitely not an inferior product (I understand most Italians eat the dried version more often than fresh), the fresh version - I am talking of home-made egg pasta - has a luxurious quality all of its own. Most fresh pasta in British supermarkets is not worth the money - make your own, or buy a good brand of dried pasta like De Cecco.
The recipe I follow gives enough for six people (with thanks to Elizabeth David, who gives this recipe in her excellent book Italian Food):
1 lb/500g flour (use any good strong plain bread flour; purists decree Italian Tipo 00 flour - though I never bother) 2 or 3 eggs salt a little water
Pour the flour in a mound on your board, make a well in the middle, break in the two eggs. Add a good tsp of salt and 4 tbsp of the water.
Fold the flour over the eggs, knead until eggs and flour truly amalgamated and you can make a ball out of the dough. Knead as for bread for about 10 minutes, flouring your hands occasionally - the end result should have a good, elastic quality.
You can then proceed to use a machine to make your noodles, lasagne, etc. etc. - or you can roll it out like pastry. Divide the ball in half and start rolling, keeping everything well floured or your pasta will stick and tear. You'll need about twelve turns. It should be thin enough to see the grain of your board. Find somewhere to hang it - on a tea towel over the back of a chair, for example - and do the same with the other ball.
If you want fettuccine, take one of the sheets, roll up like a newspaper and cut into strips of about 1/4 inch/1/2 cm. Spread out on a cloth, a pasta drier (you can get these in kitchen shops) or do as we do - get lots of chopsticks, jam them in the space between the fridge door and the top of the fridge, and drape your noodles over the chopsticks. Lo-tech, but it works in a small kitchen! Leave them till you're ready for them.
5 mins in lots of well-salted boiling water will do.
'Gli spaghetti amano la compagnia', they say in Italy. So a sauce of some kind is essential. For home-made egg noodles, I like a little butter, parmesan in reasonable abundance and lots of pepper, and possibly a shred or two of fresh sage. Of course you can go further and have with any number of accompaniments (ragù, ham & cream, etc. etc.).
The rolling is a bit of a drag by hand, and using a pasta maker is much more fun, though the washing up involved is irksome. However, the pleasure of seeking your sheet of pasta emerging perfectly even is wonderful.
And of course you can choose how to cut them (spaghetti, tagliatelle, lasagne etc. - or use the ravioli filler), using the range of attachments which come with these things.
Go for the original and best machine - made by Imperia. About £40, though doubtless you can find cheaper on the internet.
It can feel a bit counter-intuitive to make a paste with so little water, but it does come together very well, so persevere and trust the mixture to form properly. Remember that as with bread, once you start kneading the gluten in the flour will get to work to help create the elastic dough you're after. If you're used to making shortcrust pastry you'll get the hang of it.
Enjoy - and don't forget to tell us how you get on!
daisydaze - 22/04/2008 12:47
Grazie tanto, Nemorino! What an inspiring answer. I'll let you know how I get on...
Redjan11 - 10/01/2009 15:33
Hi, I live in Tuscany and my partners mum doesn't bother with a pasta machine (I have the Imperia) she just uses a wooden rolling pin with fantastic results!!!
