Fresh Pasta

Whenever I cook for a dinner party, I love doing a fresh pasta for the first course. In Italy, dry pasta is not considered inferior to fresh pasta. It is just considered different. However, here, we mostly eat dry pasta & we rarely get to eat the fresh stuff. So, serving fresh has quite a bit more value.

The past 3 dinner parties I made a simple regular pasta.

In a mixing bowl, I put in:
3 Cups of A.P. Flour
3 Eggs
1T Salt
1/2 Cup Water



And I started to mix it around:





At this point, I determined my dough was still too wet, and added another half a cup of flour.


It is easy to work more flour into a dough that is too soft, too wet. It is much harder to work water into a dough that is too dry. So, I generally like to start my doughs out a little wetter than a recipe calls for & gradually add in more flour.

After the dough had come together, I put it out on a bench, dusted it with more flour, and started to knead it.



I kneaded it for about 15-20 minutes, slowly working more flour in until I liked the feel. I work the flour in just until it loses its stickiness & then knead it to form the gluten. Then I cover it with a towel & let it sit for 5 minutes.


Then I kneaded it for a couple more minutes till it was nice and smooth.


I then wrapped it in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge.


The dough needs to rest for at least 30 minutes. I generally like to do the dough the day before and let it sit overnight in the refrigerator.


I also made a fresh spinach pasta.

Spinach pasta has a very neutral flavor. It tastes exactly like regular pasta, but the spinach is used for color alone.

I started by getting a sauce pan of salted water boiling. You want the water to taste like the sea whenever you blanch vegetables in it.


I then added a handful of baby spinach leaves for about 30 - 40 seconds.


And then removed the leaves from the water and shocked them in an ice bath.


After the spinach was completely cooled, I drained it & squeezed out most of the water in it.


I put the spinach in a food processor with 3 eggs, 1T salt, and 1/2C water.


And then I blended it until it was nice and smooth.


I put 3 1/2 Cups of flour in a mixing bowl and added the spinach liquid to it.


And I started to mix it & work it just as I did with the regular pasta dough.