Pasta is called semi-finished products made from dough mixed in water. After molding, they are thoroughly dried and subsequently used in food in boiled form. In Russia, every housewife knew how to cook homemade pasta. For Italians, for example, the word "dough" is translated as "pasta." Therefore, this is exactly what such products are called in this country. Pasta has many varieties: vermicelli, spaghetti, fettuccine, noodles and others. Local housewives also love to cook them with their own hands. Moreover, this can be done in different ways.
Pasta dough
To make homemade pasta tasty and mouth-watering, you must be able to properly prepare the dough for them. For its preparation, as a rule, two main components are required: wheat flour and egg yolks. But in such a composition, these products are difficult to mix. To obtain a more uniform mass, it is allowed to add a little water to them. According to the classic Italian recipe for the preparation of pasta dough, you must use the following ratio of components:
400 grams of flour yolks of three eggs, a little salt and 35 grams of water.
You need to cook the dough gradually:
- First, beat the yolks a little. To do this, you can use a whisk or an ordinary fork.
- Sift flour through a sieve and pour it onto the table in the form of a slide.
- In the center, make a depression and pour prepared yolks into it.
- Salt, add water and mix well. The mass should be smooth and elastic enough.
- Wrap the cake mix in cling film and let it lie down for at least half an hour.
After this, you can proceed to the next step - molding:
- The ripened dough must be rolled into a thin layer, and then sprinkled with flour and rolled into a roll.
- Cut with a sharp knife into pieces. After that, each of them must be deployed. Get even long stripes.
- Dry them for a day, spread on a baking sheet.
Such homemade pasta can be stored for a month, laying them in a sealed container.
Quality Secrets
To make the right paste, you must follow the advice of experienced professionals. Any experienced culinary specialist knows that homemade pasta will turn out delicious if the hostess follows the following rules:
- It is better to use hard varieties of flour and knead it in water. This dough is prepared much faster.
- Eggs should be taken only if there is no necessary flour at home. Soft varieties are usually sold in stores. In addition, a certain proportion must be observed: 100 grams of flour requires one egg.
- Particular attention should be paid to the preparation of the starting components. It is advisable to sift the flour before use in order to further enrich it with oxygen. Then the dough will certainly be elastic and uniform.
- The duration of the batch is usually not more than 20 minutes. Longer processing can lead to the destruction of gluten.
- The finished dough must necessarily ripen. To do this, it must be kept for 30 minutes in a cool place.
- It is better to roll out the dough in small pieces on a table sprinkled with flour. The remains must be covered with a towel to prevent airing.
- Cutting can be done with a sharp knife or use special equipment for this.
Only taking into account all the rules listed above, it is possible to guarantee that the finished products really get the desired quality.
Homemade spaghetti
In Italy, they like to cook spaghetti. This type of pasta is very popular in this sunny country. They are eaten almost every day, seasoned with various sauces. To make such homemade pasta, the recipe is often used not quite ordinary. For work, you need to take 400 grams of wheat flour, 10 grams of salt, 4 raw eggs and 17-34 grams of olive oil.
Next, you must perform the following steps:
- Sift the flour and gently pour it with a slide directly onto the table.
- Beat eggs well. To make the process more efficient, you can add salt to them.
- In flour, make a small notch on top of the flour and pour in the prepared eggs along with the butter.
- Knead the dough thoroughly.
- Put it for half an hour in a cool place for better ripening. Pre-cooked product must be wrapped in a film or covered with a towel.
- Divide the dough into pieces, and then roll each one thinly.
- Cook spaghetti using a special cutting machine.
Finished products can be cooked right away. For long-term storage, they must be well dried. For this, blanks must be hung on special devices. If there are none, then you can use ordinary clothes hangers. The result is simply amazing homemade pasta. The recipe is interesting in that oil is used instead of water. This gives the products better ductility and prevents them from sticking during cooking.
Molding rules
Residents of many countries like to cook pasta. The recipe at home is not difficult to repeat. As a rule, it is extremely simple and requires only certain knowledge, as well as the availability of the necessary equipment. It is mainly required for molding products. As you know, this process can be carried out in two ways:
- Stamping . With the help of various molds, curly products are obtained from the dough sheet. This also includes the production of noodles, when the dough is cut into separate thin strips.
- By pressing . For this, there are special screw presses, the design of which usually ends with a matrix with holes. The shape of the finished product will ultimately depend on the configuration of their cross section. If the holes are round and continuous, then the products are thread-like, and when they are slit-like - ribbon or figured. If there are special inserts in the matrix, tubular pasta can be obtained. The recipe at home will depend on what kind of equipment the hostess chooses.
True, not everyone in the kitchen has cutting machines or special presses. Then, for example, you can use a conventional meat grinder to prepare spaghetti.
Homemade Pasta Dish
To prepare an original and delicious dinner, you can use ordinary homemade pasta. The recipe with a photo clearly demonstrates how to do this best. Here, every housewife can show imagination and apply non-standard techniques. Take, for example, pasta in cheese sauce. In this case, you will need the following ingredients:
- For the test - 300 grams of flour, 2 eggs, salt, 50 grams of milk and the same amount of butter.
- For the sauce - 100 grams of sour cream and cheese, onion and 30 grams of tomato paste.
Cooking should be done step by step:
- Knead the dough first.
- Then it needs to be rolled into the thinnest layer. This is best done on a wooden surface to preserve the unique qualities of the product.
- Cut the formation into strips of a width of not more than 10 centimeters, and then fold them one onto the other, pouring flour. Workpieces must not stick together.
- Chop them into thin noodles and then roll them well in flour.
- To prepare the sauce, first chop and fry the onions.
- Add sour cream and grated cheese to it. Introduce tomato paste a little later.
- Boil the noodles separately.
- Combine pasta with sauce and mix well.
It turns out a fragrant and very tasty dish, which will certainly give everyone great pleasure.
Pasta casserole
For Italians, pasta is a dough product in the form of hollow tubes of different diameters and lengths. You can make them in advance, and then store finished products for a month in paper bags, so that at any time you can use them for their intended purpose. In Italy, they like to cook casseroles, the main component of which is pasta. A recipe at home with a photo will tell a simple, but quite interesting option. First you need to select the necessary products: 500 grams of ready-made pasta, a glass of sour cream, 20 grams of salt, 3 eggs, 50 grams of vegetable oil, 150 grams of hard cheese, bread crumbs and a little butter.
Cooking Technique:
- Cook pasta in salt water for 5-6 minutes after boiling over low heat. After that, they should be thrown into a colander and allowed to drain completely to the water.
- At this time, separately grind the yolks with salt.
- Add sour cream, mix, and a little later, add grated cheese.
- Combine the resulting mixture with boiled pasta.
- Beat the whites separately in a dense foam.
- Add it to pasta and mix food very carefully.
- Grease the form with butter, sprinkle with breadcrumbs and put the cooked mass in it.
- Bake for 20 minutes in an oven, preheated to 190 degrees.
Serve such a casserole to the table is better hot, greasing its surface with butter.
Colored pasta
Even children know that bright dishes are more appetizing. That is why every housewife should pay attention to the appearance of the finished product. And what about dough products? As a rule, they should have a yellowish tint. It is mainly due to the presence of eggs. But this is not the only option. An experienced hostess knows how to make homemade pasta, so that with just one glance they would immediately want to eat. To give dried semi-finished products of various shades, you can use natural food colors in the form of vegetable additives (juices of spinach, carrots, beets or tomatoes). They must be added to the dough partially instead of water. In this way, you can cook colorful pasta, which will look very impressive in a plate. For work, you will need 50 milliliters of green basil juice, carrots and fresh tomatoes, 8 eggs, 1.2 kilograms of flour and 50 milliliters of water.
Process technology:
- Divide the flour into 4 parts and pour them in piles on the table.
- Add water to one of them, and juices to the rest.
- Introduce beaten eggs into each serving and knead the dough.
- Slice the noodles in any convenient way. If there is a special machine for this, the process is noticeably simplified.
- Finished semi-finished products are rolled up in the form of rings or nests and left to dry in a well-ventilated area.
After this, the finished products will only boil. They will make an original and very beautiful side dish.