I made some pasta by hand in my kitchen recently, it was fun & easier than I thought it would be. The results of my hand-made effort tasted really good. I don’t know why I had not done this earlier, I think buying pasta off a supermarket shelf is just too easy.

One thing I learnt though is that a pasta machine would probably do a better & more consistent job of stretching the pasta. However you should trying doing it by hand just once for the sake of it.

With this basic pasta under my belt, I am going to try my hand at different pastas. I will probably will start with my favourite stuffed pastas, ravioli & tortellini.

Here is the recipe for the pasta dough.

You will need:

• 175 grams “00″ Flour sifted.
• 2 large eggs.
• 1/2 tsp salt.

1. Pour the sifted flour & salt onto a clean working surface, form a well large enough to accommodate the eggs.
2. Pour the eggs into the well.
3. Mix the eggs in the centre of the well, whilst keeping a ready hand outside the well to prevent eggs from overflowing.
4. Slowly incorporate the flour into the eggs.
5. When egg & flour mixture is thick, push all flour into the centre and gently mix until the dough has stiffened. Once dough cannot arbsorb any more flour. Scrape work surface clean.
6. Dust the work surface with a little flour, knead the dough with a steady firm motion.
7. Knead the dough until it is soft & elastic, this will take about 8 minutes.
8. Wrap the dough in cling film and let it rest for 45 minutes before stretching.

For the Pappardelle

1. Dust the work surface with a little flour, unwrap the pasta dough on to the work surface.
2. Using a rolling pin, gently roll out the pasta dough making quarter turns occasionally. Do this until you have a round dough with equal thickness of about 3 mm.
3. Roll out the round dough in one direction to about 1 mm. The dough should be translucent.
4. Fold the dough into thirds, cut lengthwise at about 1.5 cm intervals to make pappardelle.
5. Lay the pappardelle on a clean dry tea towel, let it dry for about 30 minutes before cooking it.

Assembly

• Prepare the pomodoro(tomato) sauce as per the recipe in this other post.
• In a large pot bring salted water to a rolling boil, then add the pappardelle & cook for 5 minutes. Drain the pappardelle.
• Add tomato sauce to the pappardelle and toss to coat.
• Serve with grated parmesan cheese & freshly ground black pepper.

Enjoy!