Well, I'm about to share with you one of my most personally prized recipes. After much trial and error, I came up with a pasta dough that is super easy to make, unbelievably good for you, has a wonderful texture, and tastes divine. Even my husband, who is usually pretty lackadaisical about food (to my chagrin -- sometimes I want him to get a little bit more excited about the things I make) was impressed. He said it was the best thing he'd ever eaten in his life.
I use a food processor to make the dough. I know traditionalists take a big pile of flour and make a well in it. But I am definitely pushing away the boundaries of traditional pasta.
ingredients:
150 grams frozen spinach, defrosted. (I suppose you could use fresh spinach if you like, but I always just keep a few bags of organic spinach in the freezer for convenience. You'll have to be careful about the quantity of flour added if you use fresh)
1 egg
1/2 cup almond flour
1 tsp sea salt
dash nutmeg
dash black pepper
1 1/2 to 2 cups kamut pastry flour (whole grain)
directions:
1. pulse the spinach in the food processor until it is a green gooey mass of puree
2. add the egg, almond flour, sea salt, and black pepper, and whirl until combined
3. add the first 1 1/2 cups of flour and pulse until combine. add the remaining flour a little at a time and pulse until the dough forms a firm ball. once the ball forms, don't add any more flour.
4. wrap in parchment followed by a plastic bag, and set it aside to rest.
meanwhile, there is filling to make!
I made a lovely filling by sauteing some shallots in coconut oil, allowing them to cool, then mixing that into ricotta, a couple of eggs, seasoning it with sea salt, pepper, and some herbs. My two year old turned his nose up at it and refused to eat it.
So, this time I kept it very simple:
simple ricotta filling:
ingredients:
1 400 g container ricotta
2 eggs
1/2 cup almond flour
1/4 cup grated parmesan (there's this cheese guy at the Riverdale Farmer's Market who sells the most amazing raw milk parmigiano reggiano -- swoon)
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp marjoram
1/2 tsp oregano
dash of nutmeg
dash of black pepper
directions:
1. combine and season to taste :)
You can also do a more complicated filling if you prefer. My mother in law can't eat dairy, so I made a filling from roasted portabellas, shiitakes, oyster mushrooms, and walnuts, jumped up with some roasted garlic and roasted red onion. The whole thing sang nicely with the addition of some ground hemp seeds, almond meal, nutritional yeast, a dash of lemon juice, and apple cider vinegar. Very yummy. But any roasted vegetables could work.
And now the moment you've been waiting for -- the making of the stuffed pasta.
directions:
1. divide your dough into 15 gram balls using a kitchen scale. Or, if you are not as ocd as I am, you can just make smallish balls of dough. A little less than an inch in diameter is good.
2. keeping the balls covered by parchment topped by a damp cloth as you work so they don't dry out, roll them out and fill them, one by one. I guess they roll out to about 2 1/2 or 3 inches in diameter
3. the dough is a little sticky, but I wouldn't add extra flour. Just work quickly so your rolling pin doesn't get dry and crusty.
4. Put some filling near the center of the circle of dough. A little spoonful will do it.
5. fold the dough over itself in half, and press the edges tight. I actually find this easiest to do by picking it up and pinching the edges together
6. Avoid over-filling the dough, or you won't get a good seal, and there will be hell to pay when you boil the pasta.
7. I do a quick press on both sides with the times of a fork. Who knows if this does anything. But it looks cute.
8. As I work, I line up the finished pasta on a lined baking sheet. You don't want them to stack, because they will stick to each other. They freeze really well, and can be boiled from frozen in about 15 minutes. To freeze, put the filled baking sheet in the freezer until the pasta is frozen through. It can then be bagged and tagged appropriately, to be used when your in-laws come for dinner an you want to impress them.
9. you can also use them the same day. To store for a few hours, put them in layers separated by parchment (including underneath them) in an airtight container in the fridge.
10. To cook from fresh, bring a largish pot of water to a boil (put a little olive oil in the water). When the water has reached a boil, add the pasta. Once the water returns to the boil, cook for 2 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon. You can either toss them in a pan with a little tomato sauce, or simply top them with our favourite tomato sauce (or top them with a little olive oil (or coconut oil) and parmesan). If you like pesto, hey, why not?
11. serve with a little pride and your favourite salad
12. My son was impressed because the cross section is vaguely fish shaped, and he thought they were fun to eat when I cut them up for him ...
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