#FoodTuesday #pasta #spaghetti #freshpasta

While my wrists were broken, OF COURSE I bought a pasta roller that I couldn’t use because broken wrists. But now they aren’t, and I can, so I did.

My first lesson was that the dough has to look like it’s WAY too dry. I make vegan pasta, so I just use flour and water, and you use a lot less water than you think. When the dough first starts to come together, it ought to look shaggy, but just keep working it. If it’s still too dry, sprinkle it — and I mean JUST SPRINKLE it — with a few drops of water and keep trying. It’ll get smooth and not sticky. If it’s sticky, put a little flour on your kneading surface and knead and knead and knead and knead. Some say you have to go for 15 minutes, but I only went until the dough was smooth and a little stretchy.

My second lesson is, after you squersh the lump out into a rectangle and put it through the biggest setting of the rollers, you fold the sheet into thirds.

Then you put it through again sideways. Keep folding it and putting it back through the widest setting (I think I went 5 times) until it’s pretty much a rectangle.

Then you dial to the next narrowest setting and put it through, then the next and so on. Put flour on it in between, if it wants to catch or stick.

My third lesson is not to make it TOO thin. I made some noodles that were so thin, they dissolved in the broth when I cooked them!

Clever old me: I also bought a pasta cutter that does fettuccine and spaghetti, with an attachment for ravioli. This time I made spaghetti. Or, as the kids called it, pasketti.

I cooked it — fresh spaghetti takes about two minutes — and ate it. It tasted like noodles. I used regular flour, not semolina flour, so it’s a little different, but still good.

Is it worth the work? It is, if you enjoy the “work”, which I do. And I can use the roller to roll out Chinese dumpling wrappers, so double win!

A WRITING PROMPT FROM ME TO YOU: Learning something new.

MA