A basic pasta recipe can enhance one’s culinary area of expertise exponentially. From there, a world of new dishes and opportunities become available. A handmade pasta, like this one, fully embodies the spirit of from-scratch-food. It’s more than just something good to eat, it becomes an experience.

Fresh Pasta (Serves about 2 people)

Ingredients/Tools:
125 grams of Tipo “00” Flour (Can be substituted with all purpose flour)
Two Eggs
Pinch Of Salt
Dough Scraper
Fork

Directions:

Step 1: Start with a clean, bare countertop. Measure out the flour, and pour it out onto the counter. It should be poured out in the shape of a short mound.
Step 2: Start with an open hand, then bring all five fingers to one another, forming an almost cone-like shape. Your fingertips being the point, and the back of your hand being the base. Use that hand shape, fingertips first, to form a well within the mound. It should look like a crater on the moon.
Step 3: Crack the eggs into the center of the well, and a pinch of salt. Then, using a fork, break the yolks and start to whisk them. The flour will make its way into the eggs by itself. As it thickens, keep scraping and thinning the walls of the crater so that flour continues to be added to the mixture.
Step 4: When the mixture gets too thick to whisk anymore, use a dough scraper to start folding the rest of the flour in. Place the scraper on the counter adjacent to the dough, push it under the dough, then fold the dough over itself. You will continue to fold the dough until you see minimal dry flour left.
Step 5: Get some excess flour on your hands, then begin to squish the dough together. At this point,the dough will be rather wet and sticky. Don’t be afraid, as it will start to come together. Keep kneading the dough as it forms into more of a cohesive mass. Kneading will take about five minutes. At the end of the five minutes, form the dough into a ball. It should have a smooth orange peel-like texture to it. Enclose the ball in plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge for 24 hours. (If you’re low on time, you can continue kneading for a total of 12 minutes and leave it in the fridge for half an hour.)

Pasta Shaping

Tools:
Large countertop
Rolling pin
Knife

Step 1: After the dough has chilled in the fridge, remove it from the plastic wrap. Lightly flour the outside surface of the dough. Using your fingers and thumbs, lightly pinch the edge of the dough sphere and flatten it out to roughly eight inches in diameter.
Step 2: Dust the surface of the counter with flour and place the dough on top of it. Using a rolling pin, start to flatten it out, keeping the entire surface of the dough level and evenly distributed. Continue rolling it out until the dough gets to roughly one to two millimeters.
Step 3: Dust the top of the flattened dough with flour. Then, starting from the nearest side, gently fold the dough over itself, letting it overlap about two inches. Continue folding and rolling the dough until no excess is left unrolled.
Step 4a: For angel hair pasta: Use a chef’s knife, starting from one end off the roll, and cut strips around one to two millimeters thick.
Step 4b: For tagliatelle pasta: Do the same as presented above, but make the cuts roughly five to six millimeters wide.
Step 5: Cook in salted boiling water for 60 to 90 seconds. Prepare your pasta dish of choice as desired.