Fresh Pasta

1. This first step can be done directly on the counter (old school) or in a large bowl.

2. Let’s go old school: Gently measure out your flour onto a clean workspace and make a nest or a well in the centre.

3. Very carefully crack your eggs down into the well.

4. Add your oil, add your salt.

5. Have a little water on hand, but our goal is to not have to add any. **if you end up adding a touch it’s ok, it’s TOTALLY dependent on room temp, altitude, etc.

6. Use a fork and break up/whisk the egg mixture and then slowly, bring the flour into the egg mixture. If it collapses mid incorporation, it’s ok, just catch the egg before it rolls off the counter!

7. Drop the fork and now let’s use our hands!

8. We want to now bring this all together into a ball, it will be shaggy and dusty and that’s ok.

9. Set a timer (GET READY) because now we get to knead it for about 10 minutes until it goes from shaggy to super smooth.

10. If it continues to be super dusty, dip your fingers in a little water and add to the kneading.

11. If it feels too sticky, add a tiny more flour, but remember every bit of extra flour you have on the counter, means it’s going into the dough, and will make it more dry.

12. Once it’s kneaded and smooth, cut into 4 pieces then wrap in plastic wrap and let hang at room temp for about 30 mins to relax. We’ve just done all this work to develop the gluten, we need to let the flour continue to hydrate and the gluten to relax.

1. Unwrap one disc at a time and flatten with your hands or a rolling pin until it’s about ½ inch thick

2. Run the dough through the pasta roller 3 times on level 0 or 1 which is the widest setting then turn to the next setting.

3. Run the dough 3 times through setting 2.

4. Run the dough 3 times through on setting 3.

5. Is your dough starting to look raggedy on the edges? It might be time to laminate it.

What does laminate mean?

It basically means making a tri-fold of your long piece of dough, then re-running it through the widest setting on the machine, to help tuck in raggedy edges, etc. Do not laminate or trifold past the 3rd setting. This means, you can tri-fold in the widest setting (0 or 1), then again on setting #2, and #3, but then stop doing it. Remember each time you switch to a new setting, that opening is getting more narrow. If you’re constantly tri-folding your dough, it will be too thick to pass through.

1. Once you’ve run it through levels 1, 2 and 3 (3 times each), it’s time to finish all the settings, but only pass your dough through one time each per setting. You might not even need to go ALL the way, just pass through until you can almost see your fingertips shadow through the dough. TIP: FETTUCINI IS LEVEL 6 ish.

2. Guess what. You’ve just made homemade pasta.

3. Time to cook it? Now you can either keep them as flat sheets to use in lasagna or ravioli, or run them one last time on the cutter, at whichever setting you wish.(ie spaghetti, fettucini, etc).

4. If you run it through the cut pasta setting, gather up the strands and make little nests on a sheet pan, dusted with a little flour then covered with a kitchen towel.

5. If boiling the pasta, make sure it’s a nice big pot of salted boiling water for 1-2 mins. It does NOT need long to cook! Sauce accordingly and enjoy!

6. If you want to wait to cook the pasta later, make sure you dust with flour and cover with a clean kitchen towel.

1. In a frying pan, melt butter then add lemon juice, pinch of salt and pepper and let melt and combine.

2. Toss with fresh hot pasta, then top with parmesan cheese. To serve, give a drizzle of good olive oil to each bowl, a sprig of basil, optional!