After buying the rollers, which came with spaghetti and fettuccine cutters, on Friday I was all set to make pasta on Saturday. I had read several tips and felt prepared.
I started with the Basic Egg Pasta recipe that came in the instruction booklet.
4 large eggs
1 tablespoon water
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
You basically put it all in the mixer bowl with the flat beater and mix for 2 minutes. Then attach the dough hook and knead for another 2 minutes. At this point you should be able to tell the consistency of the pasta you have. It should be smooth and not sticky. If you poke your finger into it does it stick? If it does you probably need to add more flour. Once it is at the right consistency take the dough out of the bowl and knead by hand for two minutes. Cover and let sit for 30 minutes.
Up to this point it was easy, it is now that it starts to get tricky. Following the instructions I divided the dough into four, took one ball pressed it flat (~1cm) and ran it through the roller on the widest setting.
It ripped. I folded it over again and dusted it with flour, it pulled on itself and ripped again. So I mushed up the ball put it back to rest and started again with a new ball. After about 15 minutes of frustration it all started to work.
What did I learn?
- Make sure all the pieces are well dusted (then patted down) with flour – if they stick to the plates they will pull in on themselves and tear.
- Make sure the pieces going through at this stage are quite flat, if it really has to pull through the dough rather then flatten it it will also rip.
- Dust the rollers too to be safe.
Once you get it successfully going through you need to use the roller attachment at it’s widest setting to knead the dough. Fold it over on itself, press, dust with flour and send it through again. Do this 5-8 times to knead. You can then start moving the plates closer together one level at a time to get the dough to the required thickness.
I am still not sure about resting the dough – that is how much dough you can work with at a time so it won’t dry out. But I did find the bigger limitation seemed to be counter space to put it all.
I then traded the roller for the fettuccine cutter and started sending dough through. This all worked quite well and I laid it out in tea towels to dry.
All and all I was quite pleased with how this turned out, it did take quite a long time to get to this stage – but I feel the next attempt will be better. I also ended up with a ton of pasta from this experience – all which is drying quite nicely.
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Too bad I didn’t read this prior to yesterday evening. I too just purchased the KitchenAid roller set (graduating from an Imperia hand crank machine) and took it for a spin last night.
My experience mirrors yours to the T. My first pasta batch tore, and became progressively stickier with each pass. I ended up tossing the first run. By the time I got to the third batch, I had the hang of it, but by by that point, the task had taken me much longer than I had originally anticipated and we didn’t eat until after 9.
I agree with you, I think next time will be better. I will re-attmept tonight, and try out your pasta nesting tips. Thanks!!