Fresh Pasta Dough
Egg pasta — flour, yolks and time
The northern Italian ratio is one egg per 100g of flour, and extra yolks make it richer and more golden. Type 00 flour gives silkiness; semolina gives bite. Half and half is a good compromise.
The rest is not optional. Freshly kneaded dough springs back and fights the roller; after thirty minutes it rolls out like cloth.
Ingredients
- 2 cups (250g) type 00 flour, plus more for dusting
- 1/2 cup (75g) fine semolina
- 3 large eggs
- 3 large egg yolks
- 1 teaspoon olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Mound the flours on a work surface and make a deep well in the centre.
- Add the eggs, yolks, oil and salt to the well. Beat them with a fork, gradually drawing in flour from the inner wall of the well until it is too thick to whisk.
- Bring the rest together with a bench scraper, then knead for 8 to 10 minutes, until smooth, elastic and slightly tacky. It should spring back slowly when pressed.
- Wrap tightly and rest at room temperature for at least 30 minutes, or up to 2 hours.
- Cut into four pieces, keeping the rest wrapped. Flatten one and pass it through the widest setting of a pasta machine three or four times, folding in three each time, until the edges are neat.
- Then roll down through the settings without folding, one notch at a time, until you can just see your hand through the sheet.
- Cut as you like, dust with semolina, and cook in well-salted boiling water for 2 to 3 minutes.
Notes
- Too dry, add water a teaspoon at a time; too sticky, dust with flour. Humidity and egg size make every batch slightly different.
- Shaped pasta dries on a rack for a few hours, or freezes on a tray then bags up.
- Semolina, not flour, for dusting cut pasta — flour turns gummy in the water.