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I dried my fresh pasta, but it turned into a clumpy mess when I cooked it. Any thoughts on that?
I am very lucky to live in the UK, and my husband is Italian. We drive to Italy every year to visit his extended family. Prior to getting to know his family and friends in Italy I thought home made pasta was the ONLY way to go, however, after meeting a chef, we learned that her favourite pasta was actually the store brand dried pasta at the CO-OP supermarket chain! We stocked up and haven't looked back since.
I love Christie!!!!
Italian "00" flour has roughly the same protein content as American bread flour, it's just more finely milled into a powder. The King Arthur "Italian-style" flour shown does have a low protein content, even lower than their cake and pastry flour. Here are the protein content percentages:
King Arthur bread flour: 12.7%
Caputo Tipo "00" flour: 12.5%
King Arthur All-Purpose flour: 11.7% (most AP brands 10.5-11%)
Gold Medal AP flour (bleached and unbleached): 10.5%
King Arthur Unbleached Cake Flour: 10%
King Arthur "Italian-style" flour: 8.5%
White Lily AP flour: 7-8.5% protein
Swans Down Cake flour: 7%
More information about the flours and how they compare to 00 flour here:
https://slice.seriouseats.com/2011/06/the-pizza-lab-on-flour-foams-and-dough.html
I buy imported Italian 00 flour from brands like Caputo, Anna, and Molino Grasso. In specialty or Italian food stores in New York City they sell for $3-5 per 1kg/2.2lbs bag, which makes about six individual pizzas in my experience. I don't make pasta—yet—but I make Neapolitan-style pizza regularly and for that and a few other things the 00 flour makes a difference (though bread flour is similar). For other breads I use King Arthur bread flour or AP flour. The King Arthur "Italian-style" flour is very different from the imported 00 flours and produces very different results. Pizza enthusiasts haven't embraced it, I imagine it's a similar story with pasta makers who are also looking for 00 flour. The protein content is dramatically different and you can't use the same recipes. The fineness of 00 flour also affects the speed of hydration and 00 dough is runnier when mixed.
If you enjoy making pasta the kinds of flour used for making pasta in Italy are worth experimenting with, most famously 00 flour and semolina flour. I use both for my pizza, since the coarse grind of the semolina flour is perfect for sprinkling on my pizza peel to help the pizza smoothly slide off into the oven. There is good domestic semolina flour available (I use Bob's Red Mill), but I don't believe there's domestic production of 00 flour similar to the imported 00 flour from Italy. Many people were hoping the King Arthur product would be a domestic example of 00 flour and direct competitor to the Italian brands but it turned out to be a different kind of flour.
She’s nice, but I don’t like seeing new faces on ATK
1:28 That empty fridge! 😱
Dried pasta is, by and large, a superior product to fresh pasta. Fresh is too soft and it's only in restaurants because most customers don't want to wait 30 minutes for dried pasta to be cooked, sauced, plated and brought out. Most people who enjoy pasta prefer it dried, including the cooks and chefs who prepare it. Also, fresh pasta doesn't really get al dente like dried does. The only thing fresh does better is that it cooks in like a minute. The only really decent application for it is in sheets for making a quick-cooking lasagna. Edit: and as Paelorian said, it's also decent in wider cuts in butter and cream sauces.
Can you roll out pasta by hand with a rolling pin, or do you need a pasta press?
00 flour is the ultimate ingredient for pasta! I cannot recommend it enough. Makes pasta feel luxurious
Thanks for the advice. I often get fresh pasta at the farmer's market.
Been a very long time since I have made homemade. Single so it's hard to make a single serving. Can you do a show about single servings of food? I like to make fresh not frozen.
Curious if you have a keto friendly fresh pasta recipe? I'd love to make tortellini again❣️
Great tips! Fresh pasta is great but very different from dry.