Shiftless Chef's Easy Homemade Pasta Recipe for Sane People, With No Shaggy Mess, and Only a Little Larry Bird

Pasta is a staple food among the budget-strapped among us, which includes the Shiftless Chef himself.  Speaking strictly for myself, I've eaten more than one dinner that consisted of pasta dressed with a sauce of olive oil, garlic, and pepper.  Thankfully, I don't remember when I last ate that.  Memory also escapes me concerning whether I embellished that meal with cheese; factoring penury, doubtful.

The meal that I described called for packaged dried pasta, which, if you're budget-strapped, know is, typically, located on the same aisle as ramen noodles, dry beans, Rice-A-Roni, and Spam, the same aisle populated chiefly by college kids, hapless bachelors, people I don't understand who really don't care about eating, and the poor.

On a lark, I've purchased the somewhat more expensive brands of dried pasta .  Having done some comparison shopping and eating, here's a tip for the budget strapped:  the more expensive stuff doesn't taste much better than the store brand.  If you drown either in Ragu (which I don't recommend, for Ragu functions best as an insect repellant), there's no appreciable difference.

If you subsist off dried pasta, you are not adequately prepared for the joys of homemade pasta, but once you've successfully made a batch, you'll understand instantly.  Homemade pasta is a real treat, creamy and luscious, with just enough tug for the tooth if cooked properly.  No kidding, the stuff just explodes, and then lingers, in your mouth.  Of life's simple pleasures, homemade pasta truly ranks highly.  If you're willing to invest little more than time and a bit of elbow grease, you can enjoy this simple pleasure yourself for pennies on the dollar*.

Here, it might be helpful to explain what pasta is.  I should say, in the interest of honesty to the reader, that I don't know what pasta's origins are (I suspect that they're simple), and I possess just enough scientific acumen to confuse you (if you're interested in food science, I invite you or poke around this site until you can't stand it or suffer a broadcast of Food Network's dork extraordinaire Alton Brown**.)  Without a doubt, history and science have value, but since I'm not a bona fide chef, I can remain oblivious to them and my pasta will still turn out just fine.

When I called pasta simple, I meant it.  At base, it consists of two ingredients:  flour and eggs.  The basic recipe for the pasta most of us are familiar with (there are too many variants to address here) is two eggs per one cup of flour.  If you'll indulge a little science here, when you are mixing the two, what you are trying to achieve is a suitable ratio of wet to dry.  Knowing what's suitable takes practice, but the best explanation I've read is that the dough should stick only to itself.  More simply put, the dough should not stick to your hands, nor should it fall apart.  Again, it takes a couple of batches to truly understand this.

I'm willing to state that some of you have already attempted homemade pasta, and that fewer of you were successful.  If I'm right, I'm further wiling to state that that might be because you consulted the recipe that instructs you to dump all the flour on a flat surface, form a "well" in the middle of the pile, crack your eggs, dump their contents in the well, beat them, and then, by degrees, add your flour until you achieve a "shaggy mass."  Every recipe instructs you to do this; furthermore, each one contains the phrase "shaggy mass."  You probably gave up at the "shaggy mass" stage.

You are then instructed to knead the shaggy mass until you lapse into an arthritic coma.  Don't worry, it's normal.  That's supposed to happen because the guy who wrote the recipe is French trained, and spent six months in the Italian countryside on a grant.  You should make your pasta on a marble slab designed expressly for the purpose, and if you're a lightweight without the commitment to knead until you turn the color of Windex due to an arthritic coma, you can just use your Kitchenaid stand mixer and just forget everything that the expert instructed you to do.  I have no issue with letting the dough rest so that the glutens (that's food science for "proteins") can relax.  Don't worry, the mess you made is normal.  That's supposed to happen because the guy who wrote the recipe is French trained, and knows most of the curse words of any given Romance language.  

The easy recipe for the unwashed follows.  Understand that this recipe yields less sublime pasta than the one made by the chef with French training.  It's still better than the school-paste grade crap from a package.

NOTE:  For two people, you will probably need two cups of flour and four eggs.  You might have leftovers, but you won't complain.


Ingredients:

• 2 Cups of Flour (all purpose, though less refined, will do if that's all you have.  It will yield less sublime pasta.)
•  4 Eggs (locally-sourced brown eggs are ideal, but the cheap store brand is fine, if that's all you can afford.)
• Drizzle of olive oil (Optional)
• Salt (Optional)
• Water (Optional, but likely necessary.  Italian mineral water is preferred, but plain old tap water is fine, I guess.)
• Water for Boiling Pasta 

Equipment:

• 1 Large Round Bowl (The bowl should be able to accommodate a bowling bowl with some room to spare.  Plastic is preferred because it has some yield.)
• A Tablespoon
• A Large Wire Whisk (Not entirely necessary, but helpful in the initial stages of the process.)
• A Water Spritzer (Again, not necessary, but helpful because you have greater control over the amount of water you add, which won't be much; that is, if you just have to use water...)
• Rubber Spatula (Helpful)
• Small Flour Sifter (Holds a half cup or so.  Not necessary, but helpful.)
• 1 Flat Surface (e.g. your counter, a large cutting board, or the marble slab.)
• Pasta Machine (I can vouch for this one.) 

     OR 

• Rolling Pin and Sharp Knife In Lieu of Pasta Machine
• A Sharp Knife Regardless
• A Pot
• A Strainer/Colander

Instructions:

• Prepare all work surfaces, measure all ingredients, and gather all necessary equipment.  Make sure everything is accessible.  When cooking, little frustrates more than having to dig in the fridge or the knife drawer or, worse still, making a trip to the store because you're an egg short.    
• Set eggs out and allow to come to room temperature.  At this point, I don't advise standing around and looking at the eggs until they come to temperature.  If you have to, go play Farmville. 
• Carefully crack your now room temperature eggs into the bowl.  For better results, separate the yolk from one or two of the eggs. Watch for shells.  Nothing betrays lack of prowess or laziness like a jagged egg shell poking out from a strand of pasta.  Fish out strays if you have to.
• Whisk eggs throughly.
• Add one tablespoon of flour to the eggs, and then combine with the whisk.  ALSO, at this point, add salt if you elect to use it.  For pasta, I like to use truffle salt if I have it on hand.  That stuff's magic.  Here's a trick:  Sprinkle a little truffle salt on a rice cake, and then serve it.  You can actually fool someone into thinking that you made a secret trip to Pizza Hut.  Truffle salt is expensive - buy in bulk for pennies on the dollar*.  Continue this process until your arms begin to glow slightly.  Turn off kitchen light if necessary.
• Put whisk in the sink.
• Wash your hands.
• Continue to add flour.  ALSO, at this point, add the oil if you elect to use it.  When you've reached this point in the mixing process, combine flour and egg with your hands. That's a trick I learned while watching an episode of Diners, Drive-In's, and Dives.  I believe the fellow is Italian, and no, that fellow is not Guy Fieri.  Guy Fieri couldn't mix water and Kool-Aid and get Kool-Aid.  All he's good for is eating other peoples' food and making faces like a baby in mid-poop.  Look at him:  he can't even dress himself!  Continue this process until the dough begins to achieve the firmness that allows you to remove it from the bowl without it sticking too much.  There will dough, shaggy looking dough, on the side of the bowl.  Using your spatula, scrape off as much of that shaggy dough as you can, and incorporate it into the dough ball, and ignore the rest.
• Set bowl aside.
• Flour your work surface.   Use the sifter if you have it - this ensures more uniform spreading.  If you don't have a sifter, take a pinch of flour, and sprinkle it on your surface.  Repeat this process until the surface is well floured.
• At this point, you should be able to flatten the dough into a soft patty.  Flatten the dough into a patty.  It should be three inches or so in diameter.  For reference, form a circle by joining your middle fingers and your thumbs.  I have smaller than average male hands.  Should be about right, unless you're Larry Bird.  If you're Larry Bird, use common sense; if you're not Larry Bird, use my rule of thumb.  Ha ha ha.
• Sprinkle a thin, uniform layer of flour over the entire surface of the patty (at this point, you should be almost be out of flour.)  Then, fold the dough to form a semicircle; then, fold the dough to form a triangle.   
• Knead the dough a couple of times to ensure that the flour you just added is incorporated.  Repeat this process until you've run out of flour or until the dough won't allow any more flour.  Throughout this process, spritz with water, if you just must use water.  One or two spritzes is plenty.  
• How are you doing at this point?  Did you make a shaggy mass, or are you still going?  Good.
• If necessary, sprinkle more flour onto your work surface; then, knead until the dough begins to stick only to itself.  You may need to add a scant amount of flour or a spritz or two of water at this point, and you may need to flour your hands.  Go ahead.
• At this point, your dough should stick only to itself, and it should be glossy, glossy like a show dog's coat.  If it is, cover it with the bowl and let it rest at least twenty minutes.  If it isn't, keep kneading.  
• Don't stand around in the kitchen while the dough rests.  The dough isn't suddenly going to entertain you by breaking into song.  Go play solitaire, continue playing Farmville, or play a couple of holes of golf.  Just don't be gone long.
• After a couple of games of solitaire, you're ready to begin rolling and cutting your dough.  Knead a couple more times (NOTE:  It's damn near impossible to over-knead pasta; in fact, the more you knead, the more the gluten the develops, which means more toothsome pasta and more science), and then cut the ball into four sections.
• Cover the balls not in use, and begin rolling and shaping.  If you have a pasta machine, follow its instructions.  If you do not have a pasta maker, follow these instructions.  
• After cutting a batch (i.e. a small ball's worth), hang the pasta to dry.  I use the back of a wooden chair.  If you have a drying rack, use that.  The pasta does not have to be entirely dry.  Also, remove the pasta carefully, as it's prone to breakage after it's dried for a while.
• Don't stare at the pasta while it's drying - you didn't construct a harp or even some smaller stringed instrument for Pete's sake, go boil some water after a hand of solitaire.  Salt the water if you'd like, and add a little oil to prevent the pasta from sticking.  
• After carefully removing the pasta, nestle it into the boiling water.  Test for doneness by first yanking out a strand with a fork (don't use your fingers - that water's hot!) and then chewing it.  It's done when it reaches your desired level of doneness.  Also, you can yank out an extra strand and throw it at the wall if you want to.  That's fun!  
• Place strainer/colander in the sink, and strain your pasta.  
• Serve pasta as desired, but here, I implore you:  that cheese in the green can?  That's the same stuff you spread along your baseboards to ward off roaches.  You shouldn't use it.  Splurge a touch and get the best parmesan/hard cheese  you can afford from your grocer's deli.   

Bon appetit, and basta!  If you used this recipe, let me know how it worked for you.  If it worked, I suspect that you'll make your own pasta again; if not, blame Larry Bird.

NOTES:

* I'm a sucker for the phrase "pennies on the dollar."  That's because I'm budget-strapped and also cheap.

** To be fair, Alton Brown's recipes have proven unfailingly reliable.  I use his turkey recipe every Thanksgiving, to the delight of family of friends.  

Again in fairness, I've used recipes from the Cooking for Engineers' site.  Thirty-plus years of kitchen savvy allowed me to skip most of the boring parts, i.e. most of the text.  I recommend the Chocolate Pecan Pie recipe.  

*** I might add pictures later.  I'm making pasta tonight.

**** I might also add budget figures to bulk up my "pennies on the dollar" claim, if I feel that ambitious.

Disregard the caption associated with the picture below.  Since I'm still awake, I calculated the cost of making the pasta.  The expenditures follow (rounded up very generously):

• Two cups of flour:  $.30
• Four eggs:  $.84
• Salt, Oil, and Water:  $.30

Total Expenditure Using Generous Estimates:  $1.44 for one pound of pasta, which is far cheaper than the premium dried stuff that doesn't taste much different than the cheap dried stuff once you've drowned it in Ragu (don't you dare drown homemade pasta in Ragu; if you do, you've wasted your time.)

Total Time Expenditure:  Not negligible, but not excessive.  Certainly worth it when you consider that while you're in the store, you're likely to purchase things you don't need, such as Doritos.  Nothing against Doritos - they're delicious.  

Sorry, no budget figures.