Life is too short for dried pasta.

Who makes pasta dough from scratch? In our prefabricated, turbo paced world, no one has time for fresh, homemade pasta. To me, this is ridiculous. You make one small batch and it lasts for at least a week. Even if you throw it in the freezer, it’ll still be better than the best dried pasta. You can flavor it. It takes minutes and not hours. I think more restaurants should make their own. You can literally do almost anything with the dough. I will submit a basic recipe for you and you can play with it. It brings a little fun into the kitchen and it can be a little exercise, too.

Take 2 parts semolina flour and 2 parts all purpose flour with salt an pepper to taste. Mix the dried ingredients in a mixing bowl and make a well. Add 1 part water in the well. Slowly mix the water with the edges of the flour until you get a sticky solid mass. Take it out of the bowl and work it hard. Fold the dough as it gets too thin. You will want to end up with about a half inch thick piece of pasta. It will take about fifteen minutes or less of working it. Let it rest for a few minutes by setting it on a tray with parchment paper and covering it so it doesn’t dry out. If it dries out, its not the end of the world but it will be harder to work into shapes.

If you wanna make it into orecchiette pasta, cut one inch strips off the pasta. Then cut one inch segments off the strips. It will look almost like gnocchi. Take the piece and put it in the palm of your hand and use your thumb in a clockwise and counterclockwise motion to squeeze the pasta into an ear shape. The piece should be evenly thick so it cooks properly through.

If you wanna make fettuccine or linguine, just roll the dough out thin and cut it the proper width.

The only thing that is left is cooking it. You can cook the pasta in salt water, stocks, or broths for whatever you wanna make for flavor you are looking for. You will have to cook it in boiling liquid until it floats(test one to make sure it is cooked through). If you cook it in saffron broth, you will get a nice pungent flavor and a very nice golden color. You can add herbs to the dough when you are almost done working it. You can use stock to make the dough instead of water. You can make or buy tomato powder for color and mix it in with the flour before you work the dough. Be creative and have fun with it. It will taste better and have a much nicer texture.