2 Ingredient Homemade Pasta — Without A Machine! | Bigger Bolder Baking

Hi Bold Bakers! In professional kitchens, the job of making homemade pasta often falls to the pastry chef, which was me. But in professional kitchens, we have beautiful pasta machines to work with. But what if you don't have a pasta machine at home? I am going to show you how you can make incredible two-ingredient pasta, all from scratch, no special equipment needed. As always, the recipe can be found on BiggerBolderBaking.com and make sure you check out my website, I've got tons more recipes over there. Okay, let's get started with our dough. So I'm going to make my pasta on this nice big marble slab, however if you want to make it in a bowl, that is totally fine, it'll be a little bit less messy, however traditionally they would make it kind of freeform, so that's what I'm going to do. So our pasta is two ingredients, one of the main ingredients is flour. Now I'm using an all-purpose flour, but you can use different types of flour, you can use double zero flour, semolina, you can try gluten-free flour, it just might be a little bit different. Also, you'll be happy to know you can use whole wheat flour and make a delicious whole wheat pasta, and I have that recipe on my website. So I'm going to put this onto my table, in one big mound. Just so you know, almond flour actually won't work for this recipe. Now just make a little well in the center of your flour for your eggs. Now eggs, this is another really important ingredient, however if you do not eat eggs, you can still make this pasta, you can replace the eggs with water and oil, and I also have that recipe on my website, and I tried it, and honestly it's absolutely delicious. So you'll be very happy to know that. So in this recipe, it is for large eggs, and you do want to make sure that they're big eggs, because if they're not, you might need five eggs. It all depends, so just try and get as big eggs as you can. Just a little note, have your eggs at room temperature, it makes the dough much easier to come together. So here I have some clean hands, and what I'm going to do is just break the yolks in the dough, and start to pull the flour from around the outside into the center, and we're going to start to form our dough and bring it together with our hands. So just keep on working the dough and kind of bringing it together. It will take a few minutes, the one thing I don't want you to do yet is to start adding in more liquid because you're getting worried it's too dry. We're gonna keep on going for a few more minutes, and then we will see if we need a little bit extra something. But as you can see, my dough is actually coming together pretty well. I say this about all dough making, breads, pastas, pastries, whatever it is, you can always add in a little bit of liquid but you can't take it out, so you always want to be really, really careful. You do want to get this dough a little bit on the drier side, you don't want it too wet because it does actually get wetter as it sits. Okay so it looks like my eggs were big enough, my dough is almost formed, there's still a little bit of dry bits, so here's what I'm gonna do, I have some water here, I'm gonna put a splash, and I'm talking a splash of water. Just to hydrate those dry bits, and just make it all come together. It really only takes a tiny little bit of something. This is why it's really important to have big eggs. So it really doesn't take any time at all, just knead your dough until it comes together to form one smooth ball, and you'll notice it starts to pick up all the little stray pieces on the countertop. So there you have it, just 5 minutes on the countertop, and I have for myself a lovely ball of homemade pasta dough. Now here's what I'm gonna do now, I'm gonna wrap this up in cling wrap, and you want to let it rest in the fridge for roughly 30 minutes minimum, and I'll tell you why. The gluten relaxes, also the flour absorbs all of the liquid, and it does get that little bit wetter, that's why you want to make sure your dough isn't too wet when it goes into the fridge, because it will get a little bit wetter as it's in there. As it's been in the fridge resting, the liquid kind of comes out a little bit, and it makes your dough the perfect texture, that's why you want it on a tiny bit of the drier side, so I'm really happy with this. So this is a big piece of pasta dough, so what we're gonna do is cut it into 4. This will just give us easier pieces of dough to work with. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna keep one of them, I'm gonna set the other ones over to the side, and I'm gonna cover them up with a little bit of cling wrap, and a nice clean towel. Now you want to do this because you don't want the air to get at them, so just keep them nice and snug underneath there. So I'm gonna lightly flour my surface, you really don't need much flour at all, just enough so it doesn't stick, then I have my little ball of dough, I've got my rolling pin. Now the name of the game here is to roll it as thin as you possibly can, and when you think you've gotten it really thin, roll it even thinner. So I'm gonna show you. It's gonna take a few minutes, I'm not gonna lie to you, but this is a labor of love and to be honest with you when you're eating homemade pasta, like, all of that goes out the window. So just roll it one way, and it helps if you just move it around the board. Turn it around, and roll it the other way. And just keep on rolling. The little bit of flour on the table is really important as it helps to move around the dough, and it makes it easier to roll as well. So with regards to rolling this out into a particular shape, try and get it kind of long, but to be honest with you, you can sort it out afterwards, you can trim off any edges. Without a doubt, you definitely need elbow grease to make this recipe. It's somewhat of a workout. The reason that you want to try and get this as thin as you possibly can is because once it cooks, it actually plumps up and it gets thicker, so even if you think you might have gotten it a bit too thin, factor in that once it's cooked, it will plump up a little bit. So that's why the thinner the better. Also you want it to be delicate and just be like really lovely pasta. Now I know I mentioned making whole wheat pasta earlier on, it is really really easy to do, we've made it, there's a recipe on the website, it's really delicious, and to be honest with you, there's very little difference. So if you're trying to get a little bit more whole wheat into your diet, that's the recipe you want. I'm getting somewhere! Finally! I'm getting somewhere! Okay. Just a little tip, when you're making any of my pastas, make sure you read through the recipe before you start because there's lots of really good tips in there. This is the kind of recipe that you have to take it step by step, so you just wanna make sure that you do everything right. I'm not sure if you can see how thin it is, but it's incredibly thin, this is exactly what we want. So this is the really fun part about this recipe, you can now make any type of pasta you like, you can cut this and make it into lasagna sheets, or you can even fill it with my homemade ricotta mix and make ravioli, or you can simply roll it up, cut it into strips, and make tagliatelle. So once your pasta is all cut, go in with your fingers, and just break up those lovely pieces. Look at that. Gorgeous. This is why it's important for your dough not to be too wet and you have flour on your surface, so when you go to unravel it, it all just falls apart. That is so beautiful, there's something about this that just makes me so happy. So now you have your fresh pasta, what are you gonna do with it? Well you can parcel it into little bundles and you can dry it out at room temperature and let it get nice and crisp, and then you can use it whenever you like. Or what I like to do is put it into little bundles and then pop it into the freezer, so I have fresh pasta whenever I want it. But as of right now, I'm just gonna cook this off because I want to show you how fast and easy it is. So into our pot of salted boiling water, we're gonna add in our fresh pasta. Now fresh pasta cooks in no time, it really depends on what you're cooking, maybe if it's a thicker noodle or ravioli, it could take a little bit longer, but roughly you're looking at around 2 minutes. My tell, honestly, is that when the pasta floats all the way to the top of the pot, that's when it's done. I love homemade fresh pasta simply with a bit of butter, freshly cracked black pepper, and grated Parmesan cheese. There's no doubt about it, I've got a pretty good job, but these are the kind of days I love to come to work. I don't have to convince you about this pasta. They made it in no time at all, two ingredients, at home, with no special equipment. It tastes absolutely divine. Definitely not going back to store-bought. So right now, head over to my website and get this pasta recipe, my whole wheat pasta recipe, and my egg-free pasta recipe. You will not regret it. I'll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking.