CALLING ALL CHEFS: Home-made pasta - what am I doing wrong?

[H u nn Y]

(I've made a post on Yahoo! Answers for extra help)

I've been practising a recipe for home-made recipe for ravioli and the pasta, quite possibly, unless it's just me, never seems to come out right. Instead of being soft (if it's supposed too) it's got a hard chew to it, not too hard that you can't eat it, but just not as soft as I had hoped for. What am I doing wrong? My recipe makes one pound of pasta in total. It calls for 2 cups unbleached flour, 3 large eggs and a 1/2 teaspoon salt. Then it tells me to mix the egg without disturbing it, then encorporating the flour to the eggs and blend it together with your fingertips. Right after that it asks us to knead the dough like we would with bread, for approx. 7 minutes and then let it sit under a cloth in round balls. (generally 2 balls, and I put mine under a damp cloth) for 15 minutes. Then I roll it out flat till I think it's flat enough, cut the dough and put enough filling inside the dough. After that, I take an equal piece sized square of dough and cover that, pressing down the sides and cutting any excess off. After all that is done, I cook the pasta in boiling water and take them out when they start to float. After that, it's supposedly cooked. I really need help with this, what am I doing wrong, what's the right way to do it? Help!!!! D:

[Renwaldo]

Are you using the whole egg? Or just the whites or yolks? What does it mean by not disturbing the eggs during mixing?

How is it turning out? Is it undercooked? Falling apart?

I am no cook, so I take no responsibility if you follow my advice and still fail at it.

However, try this: Mix the eggs and salt first, then gradually mix the flour in bit by bit. Don't dump all three cups in at once.

[Tony Greyfox]

All the pasta making I've seen involves putting the flour on your work surface, making a well in the middle, then putting all the wet ingredients in and blending the flour in from the outside inwards. Just a technique idea.

I wonder if you're not rolling the pasta enough... Hopefully a trained cook weighs in here, bu I don't recall ever seeing it made without a pasta roller. You might just not be working it quite enough to where it cooks properly.

eta: you might want to give it more kneading time and resting time, as well - one recipe I just looked at suggests 10 minutes of kneading and for hand rolled a one hour rest is better.

[Malikai Wolf]

You could just try letting it sit in the boiling water a little longer, I know I'm cooking remade pasta or rice the longer it cooks for the softer it gets.

[Acco]

Ask Carthage. And the mixing egg part means mixing without disturbing the flour "bowl".

[H u nn Y]

And the mixing egg part means mixing without disturbing the flour "bowl".

Yes, that part I know how to do. X3

[bloodredruby]

Not a chef, but I've been cooking since I was tall enough to see over the counter, so I can offer a few pointers.

When you are through kneading the dough, it should have a smooth, elastic feel to it. If it doesn't, you have under-kneaded it. If it did but is now getting stiff and a tad dry, you've over kneaded it.

Don't go my time, go by texture. Timed kneading is bullshit in my opinion.

If this is already what you are doing, then there are a couple of possible reasons for a tougher dough.

~The problem could lie in your filling. Some kinds of filling will suck moisture out of your pasta and it will end up with a tougher texture.

~Floating home made pasta is not necessarily fully cooked. Filled pasta will float at different times depending on the density of the filling you use. You have to check the actual pasta itself to test for doneness. (I had this issue with home made perogies; floating doesn't neccesarily = done.)

One thing to remember as well; home made pasta does have a completely different texture than a dried pasta, and even a somewhat different texture than that of a store bought refridgerated or frozen pasta. Home made pasta does stay firmer; most people are used to a much softer (when cooked) pasta, so the firmer texture of a home made pasta can seem undercooked at first.

Hope that I was able to help. ^.~

[JestersKing]

I notice your recipe doesn't call for a shortening or any durum wheat flour; basically what you're making is (in my opinion) a flour dumpling.

You'll get a better end product if you swap out 2/3 a cup of the regular unbleached flour for a proper Durum Wheat flour, this will give the pasta a better, chewier consistency more similar to that of store-bought pasta. Toughness in a dough results from gluten strands, which develop when flour that's been mixed with liquid is worked; in this case, the kneading. Adding a fat - traditional pasta making calls for olive oil, of which I would add about 1/4 of a cup to your recipe - helps shorten the strands and makes the dough feel softer. Also: remember that eggs (whites especially) get really tough as they cook, especially when they're present in a flour dough, so overworking and overcooking the eggs will cause a denser end product.

As for kneading, BRR is right. The dough should have a firm, elastic consistency. 7 minutes seems far too long to me to be kneading a single pound of dough. The exterior should be smooth, tough, and should bounce back when lightly poked. Remember that when rolling your dough you're also working the gluten, making the dough firmer, and ultimately more chewy. Resting time is a big one, too. Gluten strands get really worked up really fast. The more worked up, the tougher you get. Letting them sit out for a bit (15 or 20 minutes after kneading) relaxes them, making them softer. Also remember to let your Raviolis sit for a bit after rolling them, so the gluten has a chance to rest after the rolling.

Greyfox's technique idea is also correct. Make a little flour well (Make sure the salt is thoroughly blended with the flour, ) then stir the ingredients (egg and olive oil) around in it. You need to fold the flour in to the wets pretty gently in order to get a nice soft dough.

And that's how I weigh in on the situation...
Hope I didn't get you even MORE confused :$