New Year. New Pasta. Homemade Garganelli

We are just about two weeks into 2021 and by this point I haven’t flipped past March of 2020. Anyone else feel that way? It seems like 2020 blitzed past us in a complete blur and at rapid speed and for those of us here in the United States, we started the 13th month of 2020. This past week was very difficult, perhaps a cherry on top of what has rounded out a tumultuous 2020 already. If you have been watching the news you’ll know that the U.S. Capitol being overtaken by a mob of people on such an important political day. I know that in my last post I discussed focusing on the good – and we will still do that – but it has been hard to be creative in a time of uncertainty. The events of last week have left me feeling a bit crushed and deeply saddened by what occurred and I’ve had to take a few days to mentally recharge my batteries. I will always be transparent here about my feelings and thoughts and I have continued to find comfort in pushing myself to tap into my creative side with more cooking (because who doesn’t love a great meal) and writing (a comfort). I hope that this can help inspire you to do the same during these trying times, I’m virtually here for you!

Moving on to more positive things, and by positive I mean – what good things did happen in 2020? Well, I got to spend more time with my fiancé and join him on his already full-time work from home (smart working) schedule. More time with my fiancé also meant more time cooking together and flexibility in our schedules. We were able to create a comfortable work schedule and come out of our home offices for lunch and then finally after work to wind-down and prepare dinner for the night. We even made a friend with a friendly chipmunk in our yard in early May. She became curious about almonds and pretty soon, she was well-trained, came when you called her name and even dressed up to celebrate Roberto’s birthday. We called her Chipop – because in Italian the Chip n’ Dale chipmunks are called Cip e Ciop and the rest just came to us. She really saved us this pandemic and is now hibernating with 5 huge bag-fulls of nuts below the front porch and resting for her next bring emergence in Spring 2021.

I’m continuing to choose the brightest moments of this year, because although we are still in a tough spot physically, mentally I have positive intentions and resolutions set for 2021. Some of those resolutions of course mean, making more pasta because 1) it’s therapeutic 2) it looks pretty 3) it tastes simply amazing.

That’s why I’m starting off the first post of the year with homemade garganelli which originates in Italy from Romagna (later Emilia-Romagna). This traditional pasta is made from eggs and flour – yep, that’s it! – and is often paired with a ragù (like this Ragu alla Bolognese here). That doesn’t mean you can’t eat this without ragù – no, no – in fact I paired this garganelli with exactly what we had left in the fridge for a quick and easy lunch. This consisted of zucchini, red bell pepper, onion, fresh provolone, and fresh chopped parsley. It was easy and as they say in a Bostonian accent, “Wicked good”.

Now, let’s down to the meat of this post because it is actually very easy to level up your pasta game and create this fun and unique shape. All I used was my handy gnocchi board and a wooden chopstick (I don’t have a wooden dowel so I had to get creative). Before you even touch your gnocchi board, you will need to prepare your pasta dough. I love using more yolk in my dough because I love that deep yellow color that comes as a result, but it also tastes SO good. I will still forever long for those bright yellow-orange yolks that are found so commonly in Italian eggs, but for now this works. Please note that you also do NOT have to use as many eggs to make a great dough, I’ve just been actively working and refining the type of pasta dough I prefer. If you wish to stay more simple and this is your first time creating a dough I would suggest using 300g of flour (tipo 00) or unbleached all-purpose flour and 3 whole large organic cage-free eggs. Continue for how I created these:

Ingredients Egg Pasta Dough:

275g Flour (Farina tipo 00)
25g Semola Flour (Semola di Grano Duro)
2 whole large organic cage-free eggs (due uova)
3-4 egg yolks (tuorli) * start with 2 and work dough adding another as needed. You don’t want the dough to be too wet/sticky, but also not too dry.

Preparation:

On a wooden board (large cutting boards are great) take your measured flour and put into a pile.
Take your hand and put all of your fingertips together in to the shape of a cone and start to open up the flour by making a little pool (where the eggs can go swimming) in the middle.
Start by cracking your two whole eggs and follow that with two egg yolks (no whites, but save those because you can always use those for something else – no waste).
Take a fork and start to whisk your eggs while they sit like bathing beauties in the middle of their flour paradise. It is okay if you incorporate some of the flour at first, but you want to make sure everything is well-whisked.
Once the eggs are combined, you can start to scrape the walls of the flour and incorporate this into your egg mixture.
Little by little, your dough will start to form and then you’ll be able to incorporate your hands for the kneading (therapeutic “me” time) process
You’ll see very quickly if the flour is still not combining well and if it’s too dry, go ahead – add another yolk. AND another if it’s that dry. *No two eggs are perfect and I have really had to play around with the eggs that I buy and how large their yolk are*
Once you have somewhat of a nice ball formed, you can work the ball with your hands for about 10-15 minutes. (and if you really want to forgo the kneading with your hands, you can always throw on the bread attachment in your stand mixture and let it go – your pasta, your choice).
Once you have a nice smooth ball of dough, cover this with a plastic wrap (I used my beeswax wraps) or place it under a bowl and let it rest for 30 minutes.
While you are waiting you can set up your pasta machine or if you are ready to work the dough again by hand, you can roll this out with a rolling pin. I am choosing to use my Marcato Atlas pasta maker.
After 30 minutes, I slice a good 1/3 of my dough and start to run it through on ‘0’ a few times to get it nice and pliable. In-between rollings adding a little bit of semola flour so that it isn’t too sticky.
I then start to work my way up each of the levels on the machine – 1, 2, 3, 4 – you get the point. For these particular garganelli, I stopped my rectangular sheet at 7 (however, I’m going to try moving to an 8 or 9 next time).
Once you have your sheet, I cut mine into three long horizontal rows and proceeded by cutting vertically to make squares. I wanted a larger garganelli, but you could absolutely cut your pasta sheet into 4 even rows if you prefer.

Once you have your squares you can grab your ridged board. Place the pasta square on the board in a diamond shape and put your wooden dowel on top. While keeping one corner of the dough pressed to the dowel, start to roll it down over the board until it meets the other corner.
It takes only a couple of tries to get it right and the remaining shape is a cute little ridged tube that is ready for it’s final journey into the sauce of your choice (after a visit to the salted hot tub of course)!

Voila – you can officially make your very own homemade pasta and besides enjoying the fruits of your labor – it’s very cost effective to make. Unlike in Italy, fresh pasta in the states is very expensive. I’m looking forward to diving into more and more fun pasta shapes and I’ve been practicing a lot in hopes to sharing with all of you the tips and tricks that I have discovered along the way. Roberto got me a series of online courses by one of my favorite Michelin Star chefs, Bruno Barbieri (best gift ever) and I’ve been really increasing my skills watching, practicing and utilizing his unique tools of the trade. I can’t wait to share things I’ve learned and begin to put them into more recipes to share with you all!

I hope you all are safe, staying positive and are able to find some gratitude in such a time we are in. I promise that there will be light and better days ahead – think sunshine, a social life, and a great Aperol Spritz 🙂

Until then, please let me know if you have any questions in the comments below or feel free to send me a DM on Instagram and I will happily reply!