Pasta 101

We made our own pasta for a dinner party on Saturday. Making the pasta is time consuming, but fun and we were so excited when those noodles started rolling out of the machine! We made the actual dough on Friday night to save us some time the day of the party. We served our pasta with the wild mushroom sauce from Ad Hoc at Home.

Fresh Egg Pasta Dough

(Serves 4 as entree, 8 as appetizer or side)

2 cups unbleached all purpose flour

1/4 cup semolina

3 eggs

2 tbsp water

Dough

Place Flour and Semolina in bowl

Form a reservoir in middle or flour and semolina

Add eggs and water to reservoir

Mix gradually, taking flour and semolina from sides of reservoir

When mixed, remove from bowl and place on lightly floured surface

Knead for 2 minutes, until dough forms smooth ball

Wrap in plastic and rest for 20 minutes or refrigerate if using the next day

Pasta

Flatten dough ball and cut into 3 roughly equal pieces

Take first piece and cover remaining 2

Flatten until 1/2 inch thick or less

Roll through a pasta maker on largest setting, repeat until smooth

Change setting 1 smaller and roll through again

Repeat until using smallest desired setting

At this point, you can change your pasta maker attachment to a noodle cutter or just the noodles yourself

Nest finished noodles with flour and cover with parchment paper

To cook: Boil salted water and cook pasta until tender, about 2 minutes. Serve at once with favorite sauce