Chapter I: The Basics iii. Pasta
Growing up in an Italian household, we ate a lot of pasta. Most of it was store bought, blue boxes of Barilla and De Cecco were stacked upon one another in the pantry, but we would also make the journey to Arthur Avenue in the Bronx every now and then to buy fresh pasta. For those of you who aren't Italian, aren't from New York, or either - Arthur Avenue is a microcosm of the Italian American experience in the good ole' Bronx.
When I was a little girl, Arthur Avenue seemed magical to me. I would accompany my mother and grandmother to their preferred purveyors of pasta, meat, bread, and mozzarella. At Christmas, we would also go to the fish market where steaming pails of squid and gigantic white barrels of baccala adorned the shop's entrance like sentry lions at the gates of heaven. The smell was nearly unbearable but I was drawn to it nonetheless. I have such vivid memories of following my grandmother from shop to shop - horrified and yet magnetized by the onslaught of smells (fish, aged cheese, cured meats), sights (skinned rabbits and pig legs hanging from the windows of the butcher shop which was located, ironically, next to a pet store) and sounds (men yelling to one another as they unloaded pallets of good from trucks, old women calling out their orders to the workers across the butcher counter in Italian).
Arthur Avenue, a mere strip of Little Italy-esque shops and restaurants nestled amid the chaos of nearby Fordham Road, was unlike any other place I had ever been. It was loud, it was busy, and it was Italian. If I was lucky, my mother would take my brother and I to get a pasticiotti (pronounced pasta-chote) or a sfogliatelle (pronounced shvoo-ya-dell) to take home. A trip to Arthur Avenue was a treat, to say the least (though I later learned that my grandmother actually considered it as less of a treat and more of a chore, but whaddayagunnado).
Despite the alluring aromas of fresh parmigiana and salted meats at Casa Della Mozzarella and the glass cases full of pastries at Madonia, my favorite shop was Borgatti's - the pasta shop. Fresh ravioli night was a treat in our house (after you've had a fresh ravioli from Borgatti's you'll never want to go back to eating the stuff you buy in the grocery stores) and every year on my birthday my mom would take me to Arthur Avenue to pick up a fresh bag of cavatelli. That was my birthday meal and I loved it (bless my mother who honored her daughter's requests for a fresh pasta dinner even though her birthday is in the middle of summer). I loved Borgatti's because looking over the counter you could see into the back room where the men in white overcoats were hand-pulling, shaping, and packaging the pasta. At the cashier were Mass cards depicting different saints, flyers to inform us about an upcoming celebration for the feast day of one saint or another, rosary beads, and photos of family members. It was fascinating, even when I was just a little kid, barely tall enough to see over the counter.
With all of this in mind, it seems natural that my next endeavor would be homemade pasta. We have two pasta makers in our home - one is electric and I'm too scared to go near it - and the other has a hand-crank. We decided to try the 'more traditional' method for this recipe, because my grandma Rose most certainly would not have known what to do with the electric one. A simply piece of machinery, one might think just from looking at it, but alas, no....
Making handmade pasta was even more challenging than I expected it to be (and I always just assume these things are going to be a certain degree of challenging because I've yet to encounter a "simple" Italian recipe). I don't know where I felt I struggled most! Was it getting the right consistency of the dough - even though the recipe is simply eggs and flour? Was it rolling it out and keeping it flat while simultaneously feeding it through the machine, while also balancing a plate between my stomach and the counter to catch the flattened pieces that came out? I can't say for sure, but there were several areas in which I could improve for sure.
I know it is one of those things that is going to get easier the more I do it, but from a beginner's perspective I can only say that we struggled. However! When all was said and done, we did end up with about a pound of fresh linguine that we boiled and ate in a mushroom, white wine, cream sauce that same night (thank you to my wonderful fiancé, the chef, who pairs and embellishes our experiments perfectly time and again). It was worth every ounce of effort we poured into it. I can't imagine doing it alone, working the pasta press definitely required two people, but I do think as time goes on and we perfect our process, it will become something that we do regularly. It will be awhile, however, before I attempt my beloved cavatelli so for now, I'll go happily back to Borgatti's.
Fresh Pasta Recipe
2 cups flour (all-purpose or semolina; we used all-purpose because...it was what we had).
3 eggs
pinch of salt
Directions
Mix the flour and the pinch of salt.
Place the mixture on a clean surface in a pile
Make a well in the middle
Crack three whole eggs into the well
Gently beat the eggs with a fork
When eggs are beaten, slowly and gently start to incorporate the flour by pulling a bit in from the sides
When all of the flour is incorporated, knead the dough on the surface a few times with hands.
Let the dough rest in the fridge for about an hour.
When dough has chilled, proceed to follow instructions that come with your pasta maker about how to feed the dough through the machine.
OR
Roll the dough out thin, sprinkle with flour, and cut into thin strips.
A'Mangiare!
When I was a little girl, Arthur Avenue seemed magical to me. I would accompany my mother and grandmother to their preferred purveyors of pasta, meat, bread, and mozzarella. At Christmas, we would also go to the fish market where steaming pails of squid and gigantic white barrels of baccala adorned the shop's entrance like sentry lions at the gates of heaven. The smell was nearly unbearable but I was drawn to it nonetheless. I have such vivid memories of following my grandmother from shop to shop - horrified and yet magnetized by the onslaught of smells (fish, aged cheese, cured meats), sights (skinned rabbits and pig legs hanging from the windows of the butcher shop which was located, ironically, next to a pet store) and sounds (men yelling to one another as they unloaded pallets of good from trucks, old women calling out their orders to the workers across the butcher counter in Italian).
Arthur Avenue, a mere strip of Little Italy-esque shops and restaurants nestled amid the chaos of nearby Fordham Road, was unlike any other place I had ever been. It was loud, it was busy, and it was Italian. If I was lucky, my mother would take my brother and I to get a pasticiotti (pronounced pasta-chote) or a sfogliatelle (pronounced shvoo-ya-dell) to take home. A trip to Arthur Avenue was a treat, to say the least (though I later learned that my grandmother actually considered it as less of a treat and more of a chore, but whaddayagunnado).
Despite the alluring aromas of fresh parmigiana and salted meats at Casa Della Mozzarella and the glass cases full of pastries at Madonia, my favorite shop was Borgatti's - the pasta shop. Fresh ravioli night was a treat in our house (after you've had a fresh ravioli from Borgatti's you'll never want to go back to eating the stuff you buy in the grocery stores) and every year on my birthday my mom would take me to Arthur Avenue to pick up a fresh bag of cavatelli. That was my birthday meal and I loved it (bless my mother who honored her daughter's requests for a fresh pasta dinner even though her birthday is in the middle of summer). I loved Borgatti's because looking over the counter you could see into the back room where the men in white overcoats were hand-pulling, shaping, and packaging the pasta. At the cashier were Mass cards depicting different saints, flyers to inform us about an upcoming celebration for the feast day of one saint or another, rosary beads, and photos of family members. It was fascinating, even when I was just a little kid, barely tall enough to see over the counter.
With all of this in mind, it seems natural that my next endeavor would be homemade pasta. We have two pasta makers in our home - one is electric and I'm too scared to go near it - and the other has a hand-crank. We decided to try the 'more traditional' method for this recipe, because my grandma Rose most certainly would not have known what to do with the electric one. A simply piece of machinery, one might think just from looking at it, but alas, no....
Making handmade pasta was even more challenging than I expected it to be (and I always just assume these things are going to be a certain degree of challenging because I've yet to encounter a "simple" Italian recipe). I don't know where I felt I struggled most! Was it getting the right consistency of the dough - even though the recipe is simply eggs and flour? Was it rolling it out and keeping it flat while simultaneously feeding it through the machine, while also balancing a plate between my stomach and the counter to catch the flattened pieces that came out? I can't say for sure, but there were several areas in which I could improve for sure.
I know it is one of those things that is going to get easier the more I do it, but from a beginner's perspective I can only say that we struggled. However! When all was said and done, we did end up with about a pound of fresh linguine that we boiled and ate in a mushroom, white wine, cream sauce that same night (thank you to my wonderful fiancé, the chef, who pairs and embellishes our experiments perfectly time and again). It was worth every ounce of effort we poured into it. I can't imagine doing it alone, working the pasta press definitely required two people, but I do think as time goes on and we perfect our process, it will become something that we do regularly. It will be awhile, however, before I attempt my beloved cavatelli so for now, I'll go happily back to Borgatti's.
Fresh Pasta Recipe
2 cups flour (all-purpose or semolina; we used all-purpose because...it was what we had).
3 eggs
pinch of salt
Directions
Mix the flour and the pinch of salt.
Place the mixture on a clean surface in a pile
Make a well in the middle
Crack three whole eggs into the well
Gently beat the eggs with a fork
When eggs are beaten, slowly and gently start to incorporate the flour by pulling a bit in from the sides
When all of the flour is incorporated, knead the dough on the surface a few times with hands.
Let the dough rest in the fridge for about an hour.
When dough has chilled, proceed to follow instructions that come with your pasta maker about how to feed the dough through the machine.
OR
Roll the dough out thin, sprinkle with flour, and cut into thin strips.
A'Mangiare!
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