Making pasta is simple, but making it by hand without a pasta maker is quite a workout. Wow. This was my first time making pasta, and even though I just purchased a pasta maker and can’t wait to try it, I wanted to try it the old fashioned way first. All I can say is those little Italian grandmothers must be strong enough to lift a car!
To make pasta all you need are four ingredients; flour, eggs, salt, and water.
Mix 2 cups of flour with a tsp. of salt in a bowl, or on a board, and make a little well in the center. Add two eggs into the well.
Start mixing the eggs into the flour with a fork by stirring only in the center and gradually taking more flour from the sides into the center.
Add small amounts of water until it becomes a manageable dough. Use your hands while it is in the bowl to do this.
Then put the dough onto a board and start kneading.
Knead the dough for quite some time until it really starts to look and feel like the right consistency. I think I kneaded for about 10 minutes.
Cover the dough lightly with plastic wrap and let it rest for about 30 minutes.
Now if your arms aren’t already tired from kneading, they are going to get tired now. I cut the dough into three parts because I was rolling on a cutting board and only had so much room.
Roll the pasta out as thin as you can get it. If your dough is springing back when you roll it, it needs to rest more. As you can see, I wasn’t able to get it all that thin. I did my best.
I decided to gently roll the flattened dough, and cut it with a knife into thin strips. I know it isn’t perfect, but not bad for my first try!
I then let the pasta dry on cooling racks for about an hour until I was ready to cook it.
And that was it! Homemade pasta! I added some of my homemade pesto and it was delicious!
Here is the link to my pesto recipe:
https://stephaniessliceoflife.com/2020/03/05/homemade-pesto/
