Tips for homemade pasta

Find recipes that use weight instead of volume measurements.

It's not that difficult to make but it does take a few times to get it right. Don't get discouraged if your first few batches suck arse.

Great article.

Forget trying to make a pile of flour on a cutting board and stir in the eggs like an Italian Nonna....just put it into the food processor and let er rip. Way easier on the hands and better mixed/kneaded with no loss of texture.

+1 on the weight vs. volume. Find a recipe that uses semolina flour (I don't waste time and money with 00 flour). BE SURE TO LET THE DOUGH REST BEFORE ROLLING IT OUT.

I do a 1:1:1 ratio semolina to all purpose to egg (1 egg per 100g flour).

200g semolina
200g all purpose
4 eggs
You may need a small splash of water (1 tsp or so)

Mix on medium for 5 minutes in the Kitchenaid with dough hook. Knead by hand for 30 seconds or so, form into a ball, wrap with plastic wrap, and let it sit on the counter for 30-60 minutes.

Quarter with a bench scraper, form into a rectangle and flatten, then start rolling.

When you first start rolling, roll it through on the widest setting, fold the dough into thirds like a letter, send it back through the roller on the widest setting, repeat twice, then send the past sheet through the roller going down one notch each time until it's the thickness you want.

Most of what you'll make you'll want to stop at 4 or 5 - lasagna, fettuccine, spaghetti, linguine... thinner than that and you're getting very fragile, like angel hair.

Adding oil makes it an enriched dough. Nothing wrong with that, I do it occasionally. But the best friend to helping stretching and minimizing shrinking is a good rest.

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But the best friend to helping stretching and minimizing shrinking is a good rest.

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Agree on that point 100%. I don't use oil, but I do let it rest at least 30 minutes at room temp before attempting to roll. I also use the KA rollers/cutters. Learned the hard way to allow the rolled sheets to dry for 5-10 minutes before attempting to cut...otherwise, the dough is too soft & gums up the rollers badly, leading to a big cleaning project. If you do gum up the rollers, stick the roller in the freezer. It is much easier to scrape/pry out freeze-dried dough than warm, soft dough.

So after mixing the dough with paddle and doing a quick knead with dough hook, you let the ball of dough rest on counter for 30 minutes?

Then after rolling it to say 4-5 for spaghetti you let the sheets rest for 15 before feeding it into cutter for noodles?

Do I have that right?

Saw some recipes for 1/2 AP 1/4 durum and 1/4 semolina. I noticed King Arthur has a pasta flour with that ratio mixed together already. It has great reviews so I was going to try that.

I just have smaller cheap FP so I'll be using the KA the whole way.

Thanks a bunch