
Mac and Cheese
Subject: Making pasta; hand shaping; using starches as thickeners.
Pasta dough
Yield: 1 lb.
Ingredients
Method
Food processor:
Be sure to weigh your eggs. Add only enough water to bring them to 6 ounces. Put all ingredients in food processor and mix until dough forms. Continue from #4 below.
By Hand:
Hand shape or cut the noodles.
Cooking
When ready to cook, boil your water and add salt. For 1 pound of pasta, use 2 tablespoons of salt. Oil in the water is not necessary. Fresh pasta will cook faster than commercially bought pasta -- about 4 to 5 minutes in vigorously boiling water for al dente.
Hand Shaping Garganelli:
After the rolled out pasta sheets have dried for approximately 15 minutes, place a sheet on a lightly floured work surface.
Using a sharp knife, cut the sheet into 2 or 2 ½ inch wide strips. Cut across strips at 2 or 2 ½ inch intervals to form squares. Keep covered to keep pasta from drying out.
Starting in one corner of the square, roll the pasta around a floured wooden stick that is ¼ inch or less in diameter. To give the pasta a grooved surface, place the pasta square on a grooved board and roll the square on the wooden stick while applying pressure to form grooves on the outer surface. Carefully slide the rolled pasta off the stick. To prevent the pasta from becoming flattened, do not squeeze it as it is pulled off the stick.
Place the garganelli tubes on a lightly floured surface and allow pasta to dry for at least 15 minutes before cooking. The drying period will allow the pasta to firm up slightly and help prevent them from sticking to each other.
Homemade Eggless Pasta
Ingredients
Combine durum wheat flour and semolina flour in a large bowl. Add 1/2 cup hot water to flours and mix with a fork until mixture just comes together. If dough won’t clump together add more water 1 tablespoon at a time until it barely holds together. Turn out dough onto a surface lightly dusted with flour and knead until smooth and elastic, 8–10 minutes (alternatively, using a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook, mix on low speed, about 5 minutes). Wrap tightly in plastic wrap; let sit 1 hour at room temperature.
Pasta dough can be made 1 day ahead. Wrap tightly and chill.
Thickening with STARCH
Starches are frequently used in both sweet and savory sauces. Corn flour is a purer form of starch than wheat flour and is a more efficient thickener. Both wheat and corn starch have a pronounced flavor of their own which has to be “cooked out.”
Using the starches to thicken:
Simply adding starch to hot water will cause lumps to form, which will never disperse evenly. There are four techniques you can use to prevent this from happening: Slurry, Beurre Manié, Floured Meat and Roux.
SLURRY: In this technique, commonly used with corn flour, the starch is mixed with a small quantity of cold water to wet and separate the granules, which are then added to the sauce.
BEURRE MANIÉ : Here the starch granules are separated with fat – the starch is kneaded into an equal weight of butter. Pieces of this are then added to the sauce (usually used for last minute thickening) the butter melts releasing the fat covered granules.
FLOURED MEAT: This method is commonly used in stews and fricassees. The pieces of meat are dusted with flour before being browned and only then added to the cold cooking liquid that will become the sauce. The starch has been dispersed over the surface of the meat and coated with fat preventing clumping when the liquid is added.
ROUX: This is the common and traditional way of starting many sauces. A mixture of equal weights of fat and flour are cooked together to one of three end points: white roux, where the moisture is cooked out, but the white color remains; blond roux, which has a slightly yellow color and brown roux, which has a definite brown color. The more cooked the roux the less its thickening ability.
“Mac and Cheese"
Subject: Making pasta; hand shaping; using starches as thickeners.
Pasta dough
Yield: 1 lb.
Ingredients
- Flour 00 or AP 11.75 oz (2.25 cups)
- 1/4 tsp (1.7 g) baking soda or baked baking soda
- Whole eggs 4 oz
- Salt 1/8 tsp
- Water 2 oz (more or less)
Method
Food processor:
Be sure to weigh your eggs. Add only enough water to bring them to 6 ounces. Put all ingredients in food processor and mix until dough forms. Continue from #4 below.
By Hand:
- Pour flour in the middle of a clean smooth work area or large bowl. Make a well in the center of the flour. Crack the eggs into the well and add the water and a pinch of salt.
- Beat the eggs with a fork and gradually start to mix the flour in with the eggs and water by drawing the flour from the inside walls of the well.
- Once the dough becomes thicker and sticks to the fork, start working the dough with your hands. Continue to pull flour in from the sides of the well until all of the flour has been incorporated in the dough. Dough should be very stiff and it may be difficult to mix in all the flour but don't give up.
- If the dough is too moist and sticky, sprinkle with approximately one more tablespoon of flour. If the dough is to dry, sprinkle it with 1 tablespoon of water. Work the flour or water into to the dough and determine if additional flour or water is needed. The dough should be fairly stiff and dry. It will soften as it rests.
- Be sure the work surface is cleaned off before kneading the dough. Use pastry scraper to remove any pieces of dough stuck to the surface of the work area.
- Lightly flour clean work surface and place dough on floured area.
- Knead the dough by pressing on it with the heel of your hands, pushing it away from you a few times.
- The ball of dough should be moist and pliable, and will probably still be a little lumpy. Good pasta dough should be elastic and pliable, but FIRM (not soft like bread dough). It should not stick to your fingers or fall apart.
- Gather kneaded dough and form a ball. Cover the ball of dough with plastic or foil and set aside to rest at room temperature for 30 minutes. If longer than 24 hrs, flatten ball and freeze to keep dough from oxidizing and turning grey.
- Using your hands, roll dough into a log, and cut log into 2 oz pieces, then flatten each piece slightly. Spread pieces out so they aren't touching and cover with plastic wrap.
- Using the widest setting and taking one piece of the flattened dough, feed through rollers.
- Fold dough in half & roll again. Repeat 3 more times, lightly dusting the sheet of pasta in between each rolling if it feels the slightest bit sticky. The dough should feel smooth and pliable. Finish rolling all pieces at this setting before moving on to the next setting.
- Move adjustment knob to the next setting and feed each dough sheet through the rollers once.
- Move adjustment knob to next setting and feed each dough sheet through the rollers once.
- Continue to decrease roller width until desired dough thickness is reached: usually 3 for Thick type egg noodles; 4 for standard egg noodles; 4 or 5 for lasagna noodles, fettuccine, spaghetti, and ravioli; 6 or 7 for tortellini, thin fettuccine, and linguine fini; 7 or 8 for VERY thin "angel-hair" type pasta/capellini or VERY fine linguine (these settings are dependent on model of machine).
Hand shape or cut the noodles.
Cooking
When ready to cook, boil your water and add salt. For 1 pound of pasta, use 2 tablespoons of salt. Oil in the water is not necessary. Fresh pasta will cook faster than commercially bought pasta -- about 4 to 5 minutes in vigorously boiling water for al dente.
Hand Shaping Garganelli:
After the rolled out pasta sheets have dried for approximately 15 minutes, place a sheet on a lightly floured work surface.
Using a sharp knife, cut the sheet into 2 or 2 ½ inch wide strips. Cut across strips at 2 or 2 ½ inch intervals to form squares. Keep covered to keep pasta from drying out.
Starting in one corner of the square, roll the pasta around a floured wooden stick that is ¼ inch or less in diameter. To give the pasta a grooved surface, place the pasta square on a grooved board and roll the square on the wooden stick while applying pressure to form grooves on the outer surface. Carefully slide the rolled pasta off the stick. To prevent the pasta from becoming flattened, do not squeeze it as it is pulled off the stick.
Place the garganelli tubes on a lightly floured surface and allow pasta to dry for at least 15 minutes before cooking. The drying period will allow the pasta to firm up slightly and help prevent them from sticking to each other.
Homemade Eggless Pasta
Ingredients
- 1 cup fine durum wheat flour or all-purpose flour
- 1 cup semolina flour (pasta flour)
Combine durum wheat flour and semolina flour in a large bowl. Add 1/2 cup hot water to flours and mix with a fork until mixture just comes together. If dough won’t clump together add more water 1 tablespoon at a time until it barely holds together. Turn out dough onto a surface lightly dusted with flour and knead until smooth and elastic, 8–10 minutes (alternatively, using a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook, mix on low speed, about 5 minutes). Wrap tightly in plastic wrap; let sit 1 hour at room temperature.
Pasta dough can be made 1 day ahead. Wrap tightly and chill.
Thickening with STARCH
Starches are frequently used in both sweet and savory sauces. Corn flour is a purer form of starch than wheat flour and is a more efficient thickener. Both wheat and corn starch have a pronounced flavor of their own which has to be “cooked out.”
Using the starches to thicken:
Simply adding starch to hot water will cause lumps to form, which will never disperse evenly. There are four techniques you can use to prevent this from happening: Slurry, Beurre Manié, Floured Meat and Roux.
SLURRY: In this technique, commonly used with corn flour, the starch is mixed with a small quantity of cold water to wet and separate the granules, which are then added to the sauce.
BEURRE MANIÉ : Here the starch granules are separated with fat – the starch is kneaded into an equal weight of butter. Pieces of this are then added to the sauce (usually used for last minute thickening) the butter melts releasing the fat covered granules.
FLOURED MEAT: This method is commonly used in stews and fricassees. The pieces of meat are dusted with flour before being browned and only then added to the cold cooking liquid that will become the sauce. The starch has been dispersed over the surface of the meat and coated with fat preventing clumping when the liquid is added.
ROUX: This is the common and traditional way of starting many sauces. A mixture of equal weights of fat and flour are cooked together to one of three end points: white roux, where the moisture is cooked out, but the white color remains; blond roux, which has a slightly yellow color and brown roux, which has a definite brown color. The more cooked the roux the less its thickening ability.
“Mac and Cheese"
- 1 pound elbow macaroni (or other shape)
- 1/2 tsp Kosher salt
- 1/8 tsp ground pepper (white or black)
- 1 oz (2 Tbs) unsalted butter
- 2 Tbs all-purpose flour
- 1 cup milk (8 oz)
- 1 teaspoon yellow prepared mustard (if desired)
- Pinch freshly grated nutmeg
- 1/4 pound shredded medium sharp Cheddar (about cup) or combination of cheeses
- 1 Tablespoon grated parmesan
- Two tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
- Half cup panko or other bread crumbs or cracker crumbs
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add 2 tablespoons of salt. Oil in the water is not necessary.
- Melt 1 oz butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Scatter the flour over the butter and mix with a wooden spoon or spatula into a paste. Continue stirring, making sure to get into the corners of the pan, until the paste puffs slightly and lightens in color, about 1 minute.
- Off the heat gradually whisk the milk into the paste. Return to medium-high heat and whisk until thickened, then simmer, stirring occasionally until the sauce has the consistency of heavy cream, about 2-3 minutes. Season with salt, pepper and cayenne.
- Turn heat off and stir in 3/4 cup of the cheese. Do not boil after adding cheese or sauce may separate. Sauce may seem thick but we’ll fix that later.
- Add pasta all at once to boiling water. Fresh pasta will cook faster than commercially bought pasta -- about 4 to 5 minutes in vigorously boiling water.
- Before draining pasta remove ½ cup of the pasta water and set aside.
- Drain the pasta in a colander set in the sink; don't rinse.
- Stir the half-cup hot pasta water into the cheese sauce. If necessary, heat it up slightly.
- Toss the hot pasta with the cheese sauce in a large bowl to coat evenly. Pasta can be served as is with a sprinkling of parmesan or transferred to a dutch oven or individual oven proof containers and baked.
- If Baking: Mix the panko breads crumbs, melted butter, and remaining cheese together; scatter over the pasta.
- Place pasta and cheese in 350 degrees oven and cook for 20 minutes until hot and bubbly and the breadcrumbs are brown and toasty. Let cool 10 minutes and serve.