Egg Pasta Dough
Try to get type '00' pasta. This is a very finely sieved flour which is normally used for making egg pasta or cakes. In Italy it's called farina di grano tenero. Which means 'tender' or 'soft' flour. I normally use eggs to make my pasta, as here, you can either use 6 eggs or if you want to make it richer and more yellow use 12 yolks.
Try to get type '00' pasta. This is a very finely sieved flour which is normally used for making egg pasta or cakes. In Italy it's called farina di grano tenero. Which means 'tender' or 'soft' flour. I normally use eggs to make my pasta, as here, you can either use 6 eggs or if you want to make it richer and more yellow use 12 yolks.
- Carbohydrate 105.975 g
- Cholesterol 634.5 mg
- Fat 17.025 g
- Fiber 3.60000014305115 g
- Protein 41.865 g
- Saturated Fat 5.0565 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (300g)
- Sodium 213 mg
- Sugar 102.374999856949 g
- Trans Fat 2.91 g
- Calories 758 calories
Step-by-step
- Place the flour on a board or in a bowl. Make a well in the centre and crack the eggs into it. Beat the eggs with a fork until smooth. Using the tips of your fingers, mix the eggs with the flour, incorporating a little at a time, until everything is combined. Knead the pieces of dough together – with a bit of work and some love and attention they'll all bind together to give you one big, smooth lump of dough!
- You can also make your dough in a food processor if you've got one. Just bung everything in, whiz until the flour looks like breadcrumbs, then tip the mixture on to your work surface and bring the dough together into one lump, using your hands.
- Once you've made your dough you need to knead and work it with your hands to develop the gluten in the flour, otherwise your pasta will be flabby and soft when you cook it, instead of springy and al dente.
- There's no secret to kneading. You just have to bash the dough about a bit with your hands, squashing it into the table, reshaping it, pulling it, stretching it, squashing it again. It's quite hard work, and after a few minutes it's easy to see why the average Italian grandmother has arms like Frank Bruno! You'll know when to stop – it's when your pasta starts to feel smooth and silky instead of rough and floury. Then all you need to do is wrap it in cling film and put it in the fridge to rest for at least half an hour before you use it. Make sure the cling film covers it well or it will dry out and go crusty round the edges (this will give you crusty lumps through your pasta when you roll it out, and nobody likes crusty lumps!).
- First of all, if you haven't got a pasta machine it's not the end of the world! All the mammas I met while travelling round Italy rolled pasta with their trusty rolling pins and they wouldn't even consider having a pasta machine in the house! When it comes to rolling, the main problem you'll have is getting the pasta thin enough to work with. It's quite difficult to get a big lump of dough rolled out in one piece, and you need a very long rolling pin to do the job properly. The way around this is to roll lots of small pieces of pasta rather than a few big ones. You'll be rolling your pasta into a more circular shape than the long rectangular shapes you'll get from a machine, but use your head and you'll be all right!
- If using a machine to roll your pasta, make sure it's clamped firmly to a clean work surface before you start (use the longest available work surface you have). If your surface is cluttered with bits of paper, the kettle, the bread bin, the kids' homework and stuff like that, shift all this out of the way for the time being. It won't take a minute, and starting with a clear space to work in will make things much easier, I promise.
- Dust your work surface with some Tipo '00' flour, take a lump of pasta dough the size of a large orange and press it out flat with your fingertips. Set the pasta machine at its widest setting - and roll the lump of pasta dough through it. Lightly dust the pasta with flour if it sticks at all. Click the machine down a setting and roll the pasta dough through again. Fold the pasta in half, click the pasta machine back up to the widest setting and roll the dough through again. Repeat this process five or six times. It might seem like you're getting nowhere, but in fact you're working the dough, and once you've folded it and fed it through the rollers a few times, you'll feel the difference. It'll be smooth as silk and this means you're making wicked pasta!
- Now it's time to roll the dough out properly, working it through all the settings on the machine, from the widest down to around the narrowest. Lightly dust both sides of the pasta with a little flour every time you run it through. When you've got down to the narrowest setting, to give yourself a tidy sheet of pasta, fold the pasta in half lengthways, then in half again, then in half again once more until you've got a square-ish piece
Resting the freshly kneaded dough for a minimum of 30 minutes in the refrigerator allows the gluten network to relax and the hydration to distribute evenly throughout the flour particles. Skipping this mandatory pause results in a stubborn dough that shrinks back violently when rolled through a machine or flattened with a pin. Tipo 00 flour, a finely milled soft wheat flour, forms the structural foundation of this recipe by yielding a silky texture that commercial dried pasta simply cannot replicate. Dried pasta relies on semolina and water, extruded under high pressure and air-dried to achieve an indefinite shelf life, whereas fresh pasta depends entirely on the protein coagulation from whole eggs or added yolks during boiling to attain its signature al dente bite. Swapping whole eggs for an equivalent weight of pure egg yolks increases the lipid content significantly, producing a richer flavor and a deeply golden hue while softening the overall crumb structure of the cooked noodles. Thorough kneading builds elasticity by aligning the gluten strands; inadequately worked dough dissolves into a starchy, flabby mess in boiling water rather than holding a clean, springy edge. Securely wrapping the rested ball in plastic film prevents surface desiccation, stopping hard crusts from forming that would otherwise puncture delicate sheets during the rolling phases. Clamping the pasta machine firmly to a clean, stable edge ensures even thickness adjustments from the widest roller setting down to the narrowest gauge without slippage or misalignment.
