Home Made Pasta

Pasta is widely available everywhere these days but there's nothing more satisfying than making your own. In this lens I'll be sharing some simple pasta recipes like tagliatelle, some more laborious ones such as ravioli and a couple of unusual ones like gnocchi. Hope you enjoy it! (photo: my pasta machine).

Such an easy recipe for gorgeous pasta.

All you need is eggs, flour,oil and a pinch of salt:

1 egg for 100g of flour. 1 tbsp (15 ml) of olive oil for 300g of flour (300 gr will serve 4)

Put the flour on a surface and make it into a "volcano" shape. Break the eggs in the middle (the crater) and mix them with a fork, add the oil and add a pinch of salt. Work into a soft dough. If too wet the eggs were to large, just add more flour, if too dry the eggs were to small, just add a bit of water. Work it until omogeneous. Make it into a ball, cover and leave for about 1 hour. Finally divide into smaller balls, flaten using a rolling pin and pass through your pasta making machine (according to manufacturer) to make the desired shape.

I tend to leave the pasta to dry on a floured surface. My grandma used to make so much pasta in one go that she would hang bits of strings to go form one cupboard to the other all over the kitchen to dry the pasta...quite amusing...

These days there's a good selection of racks!!!!

Meat and vegetarian ravioli recipes

To make ravioli you will need the pasta you made before shaped into 2 large squares of the same size. You don't need a pasta machine, just use the rolling pin until the sheets are fine (only 2 or 3 mm).

For the filling you have two choices: Meat or Vegetarian

Meat ravioli:

Ingredients:

200 gr mince beef

100 gr cooked ham finely chopped

30 gr breadcrumbs

50 gr grated parmesan

1 onion finely chopped

1 egg

glass of red wine

butter

salt and pepper

fry the onion in butter, add the mince and cook for about 5 minutes. Add salt, pepper and wine and slowly cook for an hour with the lid on. Take off the heat and add breadcrumbs, ham, egg and parmesan. Leave the mix to rest in the fridge for a couple of hours.

On your pasta sheet add the mix with a teaspoon making sure you leave a little space between the little "knobs" of mixture. Add the other sheet on top and gently press down. Use a ravioli cutter to cut and seal your ravioli.

Vegetarian (Ricotta and spinach)

Ingredients:

300 gr of ricotta cheese

100 gr of cooked spinach

5 tbsp of grated parmesan

pinch of nutmeg

pinch of salt

knob of butter

1 egg

Make sure water has been squeezed out of spinach after cooking them. Heat up the butter in a pan, add spinach, nutmeg, salt, ricotta and parmesan. Take off the heat and add an egg. Mix well and leave to cool in the fridge for about one hour.

Fill as above.

I love the spinach and ricotta ravioli with a simple sage and butter sauce. Meat ravioli go great with a simple tomato sauce.

To cook boil in salted water making sure you do not overcook as fresh pasta cooks faster then dry pasta form packets.

home made gnocchi recipe

Gnocchi;

Ingredients:

1 kg potatoes (mashed)

300 gr flour

1 egg

mix the flour and mashed potatoes together and add the egg. Mix into a dough. Make some string like shapes about 2 cm in diameter and cut it into small cilinders about 1.5 cm long. Finally roll them on a fork or a gnocchi shaping block (look at the you tube video below). Boil them in salted water; they are cooked as soon as the come up to the surface (cook very quickly). Perfect with bolognese, simple tomato sauce or mushroom pasta sauce.

gnocchi alla romana recipe

Gnocchi alla romana:

Ingredients:

Butter 100gr

cheddar cheese 30gr

milk 1 litre

parmesan (grated) 120gr

semolina (fine) 250gr

2 egg yolks

sprinkle of nutmeg

salt

Put the milk in a pan with butter, salt and nutmeg. Bring to the boil. Add the semolina and mix vigorously. Cook until dense (few minutes) mixing contantlly. Take off the heat and add the yolks and 80 gr of the parmesan. Mix. Put the mixture on a oiled surface and spread it into a sheet about 1 cm thick. Butter an oven dish. Use a round cutting shape to cut the sheets into circles about 5 cm in diameter and put on the oven dish arranging them as in the picture below. Finally cover with grated cheddar, parmesan and put a little melted butter on top. Cook in the oven for about 20 minutes. Serve immediately.