First time pasta maker

[ellencho]

Hi all. So for my birthday my kind sister bought me a set of kitchenaid pasta roller attachments. I am very excited to begin making my own pasta (I'd like my first attempt to be ravioli) but I need a bit of advice.

First, I was told that the best way to initially clean out your pasta rollers is to run a batch of dough through them that you'll just throw out when you're done. Is it possible to make a faux pasta dough without using eggs? I feel like it's such a waste of eggs if I use them in a pasta dough that will be thrown out and not eaten.

Second, I wanted to use Alfred Portale's pasta recipe from his Gotham Bar and Grill cookbook, however, it calls for 1.5 cups of AP flour, and 1.5 cups of semolina flour. The AP flour is not a problem for me to find, but the semolina flour is another story. I drove all afternoon visiting five supermarkets looking for semolina flour and none of them carried it. Even Whole Foods and Trader Joes. So is semolina flour necessary? and how is it different from regular flour? if it contains more gluten or protein than AP flour can't I just substitute bread flour, and just knead it a little bit longer?

Any sort of help will be much appreciated. TIA.

[melkor]

You can make pasta with pretty much any combo of flour and wet. 100 grams of flour and one egg is more or less the standard base. To clean out the rollers, just mix a bit of flour and some water and keep adding flour or water and mixing until you have a reasonably firm dough. I make all my pasta using only semolina, some people use only AP flour - if your using AP it will cook faster, if your not using eggs - it will cook faster. Pasta is pretty foolproof, just keep tinkering with it and you'll be making great pasta in no time.

[Katherine]

Pasta dough can be made without eggs.

I suppose semolina flour is necessary to exactly duplicate the exact effect of this recipe, but hand-made pasta can be made from all-purpose flour.

Semolina flour pasta will be harder to work with, so you're better off starting with a recipe that uses only regular types of wheat flours.

Bread flour will be harder to knead, too, especially if you don't have a stand mixer. Start with all-purpose flour for the easiest initiation.

[zora]

One tip that seems counterintuitive from a pastry standpoint (one time I was making pasta in front of my anal baking friend, and she couldn't figure out what was going on): If the dough is tearing or acting up, add more flour.

Also, letting it rest for a couple of hours before you start rolling it really makes a difference.

It's so delicious and tender--very worth it. And it's one of those things that looks fun, so if you get tired you can palm the work off on spectators, a la Huck Finn and the fence.

[zora]

Oh, and that phrase "smooth as a baby's bottom"--that's what you're going for in the kneading stage.

[schneich]

BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT !!

a real pasta can never be made without semolina or durum wheat as it is also

called. this is mainly because all purpose flour is high in starch and low in gluten.

btu youll NEED the gluten to get a proper binding, without your pasta will be soggy

and gluey.

to clean you kitchenaid attachments (i also own them) just put a little bit of

dough through your attachments 5 or 6 times thats enough!

recipewise i can tell you my special recipe which even turns a noodlehater

into a pastalover ;-)

first of all mix breadflour and semolina fifty fifty to get a decent pasta flour !

then take 300 grams of this pastaflour, 1 whole egg, 7 YOLKS!!!, 1 tbsp. olive oil

1/2 tsp. salt and knead with your doughhook until you get a crumblike texture

scrape the bowl onto table and knead until the dough comes together (takes a few minutes) as soon as you get a dough put it through the biggest setting of your

pasta attachment until smooth. (at first it will be a bit crumbly but after about 2 times it will be smooth) then put into plasticbag and rest in fridge for at least 2

hours better overnight. if you make taglierini never use the thinnest setting ( 7 )

cause it will form a glob after cooking. i use 6 or sometimes even 5 !!

at the moment iam working on a little pastacourse that will be up pretty soon

it will feature filled pasta and will be done with my kitchenaid... :-)

very often i take the above recipe and add 0.5 gram of saffron and a little

malabar pepper. then i do 40 cm long plates of dough (on 5) and cut

them with a wheelknife (pizza) into rustic very wide pappardelle, i then

lay them on kitchenpaper next to each other NO OVERLAPING to dry overnight

usually all tables are full

the next day when the pasta has dried i put it in airtight containers. if dried eggpasta easily lasts 3 months.

happy pastamaking !!!

cheers

t.

[schneich]

Pasta dough can be made without eggs.

I suppose semolina flour is necessary to exactly duplicate the exact effect of this recipe, but hand-made pasta can be made from all-purpose flour.

Semolina flour pasta will be harder to work with, so you're better off starting with a recipe that uses only regular types of wheat flours.

Bread flour will be harder to knead, too, especially if you don't have a stand mixer. Start with all-purpose flour for the easiest initiation.

no egg pasta with all purpose flour...

YUK! !!!!!

should be under "worst foods"...

t.

[melkor]

Pasta dough can be made without eggs.

I suppose semolina flour is necessary to exactly duplicate the exact effect of this recipe, but hand-made pasta can be made from all-purpose flour.

Semolina flour pasta will be harder to work with, so you're better off starting with a recipe that uses only regular types of wheat flours.

Bread flour will be harder to knead, too, especially if you don't have a stand mixer. Start with all-purpose flour for the easiest initiation.

no egg pasta with all purpose flour...

YUK! !!!!!

should be under "worst foods"...

t.

Believe what you wish, but the standard pasta recipe is 100 grams of 00 flour with one egg - 00 flour is far closer to AP than it is to semolina.

[schneich]

sorry but it sounds that you dont know much about

flour and pasta

AP is much lower in gluten then breadflour (up to 4%)

and every baker knows that this makes a big difference !!

and your "standard pasta recipe" simply sucks!

t.

[Toliver]

BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT !!

I take it you feel strongly about this.

That's the nice thing about this board...there is often more than just one solution to a problem, more than one way cook a goose (to mix up my metaphors) or make pasta.

It may not be your way to do it or even the "right" way (whatever that is) to do it, but it is a way to do it that has obviously brought success to those who've posted about it.

edited to add: Lighten up!

Edited February 27, 2004 by Toliver (log)

[schneich]

Believe what you wish, but the standard pasta recipe is 100 grams of 00 flour with one egg - 00 flour is far closer to AP than it is to semolina.

also 00 is soft wheat and has absolutly nothing to do

with durum (which is hard wheat)

t.

[melkor]

Believe what you wish, but the standard pasta recipe is 100 grams of 00 flour with one egg - 00 flour is far closer to AP than it is to semolina.

also 00 is soft wheat and has absolutly nothing to do

with durum (which is hard wheat)

t.

So.... your agreeing or disagreeing with me about AP being a better sub for 00 than semolina? I buy semolina flour 50lbs at a time, but that doesn't mean I believe its the only way to make good pasta.

[schneich]

BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT !!

I take it you feel strongly about this.

That's the nice thing about this board...there is often more than just one solution to a problem, more than one way cook a goose (to mix up my metaphors) or make pasta.

It may not be your way to do it or even the "right" way (whatever that is) to do it, but it is a way to do it that has obviously brought success to those who've posted about it.

edited to add: Lighten up!

its always the question of how you define success...

these days there are so many people who just dont know

how to do even the most basic things right. surely there are

many ways to reach rome, but to write such bullshit about

making pasta just is just physical hurting and wont lead to edible results period.

besides that it will disappoint newbies when trying out new things...

warm cheers

t.

[schneich]

Believe what you wish, but the standard pasta recipe is 100 grams of 00 flour with one egg - 00 flour is far closer to AP than it is to semolina.

also 00 is soft wheat and has absolutly nothing to do

with durum (which is hard wheat)

t.

So.... your agreeing or disagreeing with me about AP being a better sub for 00 than semolina? I buy semolina flour 50lbs at a time, but that doesn't mean I believe its the only way to make good pasta.

i agree that you dont know the product you work with....

t.

[ludja]

I was curious about some issues after reading this thread and decided to look through some of my cookbooks, including Lidia Bastianich's, Lidia's Italian Table.

She gives two recipes for fresh pasta; "Basic Egg Pasta Dough" (2 cups all-purpose flour, 3 large eggs, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/3 tsp evoo, warm water as needed) and "Semolina Pasta Dough" (2 1/2 cups APF, 1 1/2 cups semolina, 1 large egg, 1 tsp salt, warm water as needed).

Anyway, she says that fresh pasta in northern Italy is typically made with low protein content flour, '00'. She says that the closest equivalent in the US is all-purpose flour (APF) as Melkor described. She says that in the south where durum wheat (the hardest wheat) grows fresh pasta is usually made from flour ground from durum, i.e semolina. She also mentions that the textures of the two doughs are very different--cooked fresh or if dried at room temp. first. She mentions that although fresh semolina pasts can be be made with 100% semolina; she uses a mix.

I guess I'll leave this without further comment.

I have another question for people though, getting back to the original question on this post--which, if either, of these types of doughs would be easier for a beginner?

(I've only made the "egg pasta' type doughs,, ie. just all purpose flour; that was not too difficult).

Edited February 28, 2004 by ludja (log)

[melkor]

I have another question for people though, getting back to the original question on this post--which, if either, of these types of doughs would be easier for a beginner?

(I've only made the "egg pasta' type doughs,, ie. just all purpose flour; that was not too difficult).

Whats easier for a beginner depends on what else your comfortable with - semolina based doughs are firmer and harder to roll out but they cook slower so are easier to cook, AP based doughs are easy to make but are also easy to overcook. But clearly you should ignore this post, as schneich says - I obviously don't know my ass from a hole in the ground.

[Katherine]

THOU SHALT NOT OVERLAPE!!!

Thus spake Schneich

[JosephB]

I have had masterful results making tagliatelli and the like using Marcella Hazan's 2 eggs to 1 cup of unbleached all purpose, lots of manual kneading, and a good one hour rest. There are at least 3 other fine palated eGulleteers who can personally attest to the excellent results I got using this method.

Does anyone have a definitive reason why some pasta recipes call for EVOO?

[Squeat Mungry]

A very informative article on the different types of pastas and the flours used in making them can be found here.

Cheers,

Squeat

[Kahrs]

Ravioli is a good one to start with --- it's amazingly better than anything you can buy. A few caveats: (1) Be sure to flour your surface well otherwise you'll be scraping your beaut works of art off and it'll cramp/crimp their style. (2) I use a little water to seal the edges (3) Cook 'em fast, they will be done in no time at all, so don't overcook them.

Also, no one seems to have mentioned this, but where are you going to put the pasta once it comes out of the machine? You might want to consider (1) getting a drying rack or (2) finding somewhere to store them where they won't stick. (the traditional grad student method is a broomstick with wax paper).

Have fun, you'll be amazed.

[dano1]

boy somebody's got a spoon up their ass. My "basic"ratio for fresh pasta is 8oz AP, 8oz semolina, 1T EVO, salt tt, 4-6eggs depending on environmental variables.

either mixer or well method works, knead until elastic and refrigerate for 1 hr(lets gluten relax and makes it easier to roll). I go thru the widest setting 8-10 times folding over and then send through the narrower settings, making sureit's well floured. Cut and dry over a hanger or curl into portons, dusting well with semolina.

hth, danny

[Katherine]

boy somebody's got a spoon up their ass. 

C'mon, tell us how you really feel.

[ellencho]

Yikes! I never meant for everyone to get so riled up about pasta! But wow, so much good advice, I'm not even sure where to start!

Anyway, I wanted to thank everyone for their tips and tricks. I learned a lot of good stuff - like about adding extra flour, the differences between types of flour, letting your dough rest, having drying racks ready. Also, I think I'm going to leave most of the kneading to my kitchenaid to do for me, and thanks to whoever gave me the "baby's bottom" advice.

Thanks again all. Admittedly, I'm not expecting to make the best ravioli ever, but I'm sure all of your suggestions will make it better than it would have been had I been flying by the seat of my pants.

[Adam Balic]

Yikes! I never meant for everyone to get so riled up about pasta! But wow, so much good advice, I'm not even sure where to start!

Anyway, I wanted to thank everyone for their tips and tricks. I learned a lot of good stuff - like about adding extra flour, the differences between types of flour, letting your dough rest, having drying racks ready. Also, I think I'm going to leave most of the kneading to my kitchenaid to do for me, and thanks to whoever gave me the "baby's bottom" advice.

Thanks again all. Admittedly, I'm not expecting to make the best ravioli ever, but I'm sure all of your suggestions will make it better than it would have been had I been flying by the seat of my pants.

ellencho - the most important thing is for you to decide what you want to do with the pasta. It is much easier then you may think and can be a very fun and social activity. If you have kids they will most likely enjoy helping to stuff pasta etc.

In the north of Italy where many of the stuffed pasta originate, it is usual to use soft wheat flour. This type of flour comes in many grades, but "00" is mostly used. It is very refined (in a good way) and has low amounts of the things that will make many pasta doughs turn grey and give you a murky coloured pasta. It also has a relatively low protein content, so less gluten can be formed. This is why eggs are commonly added, to give the starch in the flour some protein to hang on to!

The dried pasta in the shops and most of the pasta types from the south of Italy are made from durum wheat flour (semolina - fine grade, not the stuff for puddings), this contains a high protein content and so produces much gluten. So it doesn't require the egg, and in some cases this would be overkill. It also produces naturally yellow pasta, whereas the soft wheat flour produces white pasta, unless you use many highly coloured eggs.

In practice, you can use either after all you are the one going to eat it. I find that the two flours produce pasta with different mouth feels and I prefer the soft wheat flour for stuffed pasta, tagliatelle, papadelle and lasagna. Durum wheat flour for finer types of pasta. These are my preferences and don't reflect anything other then that (for instance lasagna pasta is made in the north and south using different flours, so what is authentic etc).

If using soft wheat flour, it really is worth finding some Italian '00' grade and getting the best eggs you can find. One thing that isn't commonly mentioned is that it is possible to fry stuffed pasta (soft wheat with egg) and these make good things to hand around at parties etc.

Enjoy.

[schneich]

Yikes! I never meant for everyone to get so riled up about pasta! But wow, so much good advice, I'm not even sure where to start! 

Anyway, I wanted to thank everyone for their tips and tricks. I learned a lot of good stuff - like about adding extra flour, the differences between types of flour, letting your dough rest, having drying racks ready. Also, I think I'm going to leave most of the kneading to my kitchenaid to do for me, and thanks to whoever gave me the "baby's bottom" advice.

Thanks again all. Admittedly, I'm not expecting to make the best ravioli ever, but I'm sure all of your suggestions will make it better than it would have been had I been flying by the seat of my pants.

ellencho - the most important thing is for you to decide what you want to do with the pasta. It is much easier then you may think and can be a very fun and social activity. If you have kids they will most likely enjoy helping to stuff pasta etc.

In the north of Italy where many of the stuffed pasta originate, it is usual to use soft wheat flour. This type of flour comes in many grades, but "00" is mostly used. It is very refined (in a good way) and has low amounts of the things that will make many pasta doughs turn grey and give you a murky coloured pasta. It also has a relatively low protein content, so less gluten can be formed. This is why eggs are commonly added, to give the starch in the flour some protein to hang on to!

The dried pasta in the shops and most of the pasta types from the south of Italy are made from durum wheat flour (semolina - fine grade, not the stuff for puddings), this contains a high protein content and so produces much gluten. So it doesn't require the egg, and in some cases this would be overkill. It also produces naturally yellow pasta, whereas the soft wheat flour produces white pasta, unless you use many highly coloured eggs.

In practice, you can use either after all you are the one going to eat it. I find that the two flours produce pasta with different mouth feels and I prefer the soft wheat flour for stuffed pasta, tagliatelle, papadelle and lasagna. Durum wheat flour for finer types of pasta. These are my preferences and don't reflect anything other then that (for instance lasagna pasta is made in the north and south using different flours, so what is authentic etc).

If using soft wheat flour, it really is worth finding some Italian '00' grade and getting the best eggs you can find. One thing that isn't commonly mentioned is that it is possible to fry stuffed pasta (soft wheat with egg) and these make good things to hand around at parties etc.

Enjoy.

again i think most of you people really dont know the difference

between flour type´s....

Weak flour

(also known as soft flour or hi-ratio flour) has a low gluten content of approx. 8% and is therefore ideal for delicate cake and sponge production

Medium flour

(also known as all purpose flour) is produced so that it is suitable for products that have to be chemically aerated. It is weak enough to stop toughening but strong enough to stand the pressures of the gases resulting from the use of baking powders etc. It is also a good all round flour for bread-crumbing, batters, scones etc

Strong flour

(also known as tipo 00) has a high gluten content, that makes it ideal for yeast products, breads, puff pastry and pasta

Durum wheat flour

(also known as Durum flour and semolina flour) this is specially produced for the production of pastas.

i stay with my conclusion that one cannot make decent pasta with

AP flour, no matter how many italian mamsels write so in their cookbooks.

also the flours in italy are totally different to those in the US. ( you can trust

me on this since i used AP and here in germany i get a very fine premium grade

tipo 00 organic flour imported directly from a small mill in ragusa sicilia.)

Also the description "AP" or "00" or "breadflour" will not tell you everything

about your flour. i have seen flours of the same category that behaved

totally different when making bread or pasta.

so

good luck...

t.