Simple Homemade Pasta (Cavatelli) Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 Heaping Handful Matthews Tipo 00 Flour (depends on the size of your hands, but usually about 110g)
- Water (see the method for advice
about the quantity)
This recipe is designed to make pasta making as easy as possible - Pasta making doesn’t need to be uber precise, it’s all about the feeling! Bringing the dough together is a balance of flour and water until it feels just right. We made Cavatelli with this recipe, but you can shape your pasta any way you like!
- Baker: Sophie Carey
- Makes: 1 Portion (the recipe can be increased to feed as many as needed)
- Prep time: 10 Minutes
- Bake time: N/A
- Flours used: Matthews Tipo 00 Flour
Simple Homemade Pasta Method:
- Measure out your flour by adding 1 handful for each adult you intend to feed to a bowl, then start adding water a little at a time - the general rule is that you need about half as much water as you have flour
- Mix until you have a dough which isn’t sticky but also isn’t crumbly - if it is sticky you can just add a little more flour and knead it in, if it’s crumbly just add a teaspoon of water until it isn’t!
- Once you have a dough that is the right texture, tip it onto a clean counter and start kneading. You should knead the pasta dough until it is smooth and supple - this typically takes about 10 minutes.
- Wrap the dough up or leave it under an upside-down bowl for 15 minutes to rest so the gluten relaxes.
- You can now shape this into any pasta shape you like - there are lots of things lying around the average house that can be used to help shape pasta. I like using my cheese grater. Pinch off a piece of dough about the size of a marble, then lightly flour it by dipping it into a little pot of flour. Use your thumb to press the ball of dough into the small grate side of your cheese grater and then roll the ball down, keeping pressure. This will flatten the ball and create little spikes in one side which help to catch the sauce.
- Leave the pasta on a floured tray for 20 minutes to dry out a little before cooking in salted water for 2 minutes, then toss in your favourite sauce!
