Fresh pasta

The Goods*:

6 oz. semolina flour, plus some extra

4 oz. (2 large) eggs

Weigh out the flour in a large bowl. Make an opening in the center, this is where the eggs will go. Crack the eggs and add them to the "cup" in the flour. With your hands, incorporate the flour and the eggs.

After the dough is mixed, transfer to a well-floured working surface. Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes. The goal is to even out the dough and produce a velvety texture. After kneading, form the dough into a disc, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for 10 minutes to an hour.

After refrigerating, cut the dough into four equal-sized pieces. On a well-floured surface, roll each piece into a flat sheet. It is important to make the entire sheet as thin as possible (without any portion of it tearing), while maintaining an even thickness throughout the sheet. Hang the sheets on a rack (or failing that, a kitchen chair) for approximately half an hour to dry before cutting. Using a paring knife, cut ~1 cm thick fettucini noodles**. Cook the pasta in a large (as large as possible) pot of boiling, well-salted water. The noodles should cook quickly, give them a minute after they've floated to the surface. Serve with anything at all. I served this batch simply, with olive oil, chopped garlic, parsley, and thyme.

The eggs meet the flour.

The pasta sheets dry on a kitchen chair. Classy.

The freshly cut product.

*I was pretty surprised to learn that the ratio for pasta is simply 3 parts flour : 2 parts egg. Making pasta at home really is this easy. I didn't even use a crank or extruder or any other pasta making device, just a rolling pin.

**Obviously, this is where a pasta-maker would come in handy. The down-side here is the possibility (read: inevitability) of non-uniform noodle thickness. This may complicate things in cooking and is also an aesthetic bummer.