Prime Cuts

So, sometimes cooking leads you down dark, scary paths that seem hard to come back from.  A perfect example of this is when you realize how simple it is to make your own tomato sauce. Next you decide to make your own sausage, then make your own ricotta, then you start thinking about making your own butter and then suddenly you have a farm in your back yard and you realize you’ve gone too far. However, while going down this path, making your own pasta is one that is worth the simple effort especially when paired with light, delicate sauces.

My brother and I decided to give it a shot. How hard could it be right? Well, with the wrong recipe and a new pasta rolling machine, it can be quite the hilarious task. We first started with differing recipes, my brother wanted to try a KitchenAid recipe while I wanted to attempt a Martha Stewart recipe.  I know that the recipe for pasta dough is stupid simple but as I looked across all of my cookbooks, they all differed and varied in the amounts of the flour and egg and the amount they yielded.

At first I made a nice flour mound shaping it into a bowl, then I cracked the eggs into the middle, I started bringing in the flour and then like a fool I broke the wall and egg went everywhere. I started throwing flour down like it was a chemical spill. I managed to save the dough or so I thought. We kneaded it and the dough just never came together so we sat it aside. My brother then turned his attention to his KitchenAid recipe using his mixer to do the handy work, the recipe and the mixer didn’t offer much help. The dough was almost dried before we finished rolling it out.  Almost completely defeated for failing to complete a stupid simple recipe I decided to open up the Ratio app on my iPhone by Michael Ruhlman. This book and app by the same name has intrigued me for a while, thinking how could this guy get something right that so many people have missed. In fact, I was thinking that Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio was the book for me, very formulaic in it’s ratios, giving you a base to start from.

I found the pasta dough recipe in Ratio and weighed the ingredients out and began mixing, then kneading, and finally resting. After resting, my brother and I rolled out the dough and started to use our pasta roller and cutter, it worked perfectly. We dried some for later and the rest threw into a pot of boiling water to go alongside a rough version of Scott Conant‘s tomato sauce I remember seeing on No Reservations. I remember the sauce being basic and simple to make but Scott always insisting it was fresh and light which is exactly what I was looking for to pair with my fresh pasta. Once the pasta was about 90% there I pulled it into a pan and finished it in the pan with the sauce to help the noodles soak up and bind well with the sauce. The end result was fantastic, light, airy and filling.

After this journey of making my own fresh pasta I wondered why anyone would buy fresh pasta instead of making it themselves.  I understand if you don’t know how to make all the fancy noodles but for the basic strand or ribbon pasta like fettuccine, linguine, lasagne, or spaghetti; it’s incredibly simple to do it yourself.

To be honest, I wasn’t a believer in the ratio thing until I started seeing so many differing recipes for the same dish for the same serving size. This was when I started looking for something more standardize and when I found Ratio. If you haven’t read it yet you should, whether you’re new or experienced it is good to have these ratios by your side rather than ten recipe cards or books. Michael Ruhlman walks you through how to add almost any variation you can imagine which is the real power behind Ratio, enabling you to make recipes rather than super-powerful, celebrity chefs telling you what to make this month. I love this and think it is kind of cool to enable yourself to make your own recipes for basic stuff because now you know how not to mess up what you’re making. You can now add your own personal or cultural touch to anything without worrying about botching the whole thing.

Fresh Pasta Ratio Recipe

3 Parts Flour
2 Parts Eggs (Figure about 1 egg per serving)

Example: Roughly 2 Servings

6 Ounces Flour (weighed)
4 Ounces Egg (weighed)

Combine flour and egg and knead until smooth like any other pasta dough, nothing new or different but the ratio is dead on. After the ratio you treat the dough like any other pasta dough, rolling it out and cutting.

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More and more, I hear people talking about how much they love breakfast. They love it so much that they want to eat it not just for breakfast, but for lunch and dinner! And hey, I love it, too. There’s something great about lazily sipping a hot cup of coffee on a slow Sunday morning while nibbling on tender biscuits, crisp bacon, or fluffy scrambled eggs.

And it’s that which I’m going to talk about today. EGGS. The unsung heroes of the kitchen, eggs are responsible for making our custards and ice creams rich and creamy, for helping our breads to rise, and for making our pastries poofy.

To my mind, there are few things as satisfying for breakfast as scrambled eggs. Satisfying, of course, as long as they’re made well. And it’s amazing how often they aren’t. By virtue of our slapdash, get-it-done fast way of life, a dish as simple and wonderful as scrambled eggs often gets ruined in the name of haste. If you’re willing to take a little time and exercise a modicum of patience, you’ll be rewarded with eggs that are fluffy, creamy and delicious.

Perfect Scrambled Eggs

Ingredients and Preparation

You’ll need a nonstick pan, heated over medium-low heat. You’ll need eggs. 5 of them. Fresh, size large (in case you’ve ever wondered, when a recipe calls for an egg, it references a large egg, unless otherwise specified). You’ll need 5 tablespoons of half-and-half; one tablespoon per egg. You’ll also need a tablespoon of butter. Another nice touch is some freshly-grated nutmeg.

Crack the eggs into a medium-sized bowl. Add one tablespoon of half-and-half per egg, and a bit of freshly-grated nutmeg (you’ll be surprised how much can be added to eggs, simply by adding this little culinary treasure). Beat vigorously with a fork or wire whisk. Set aside.

In your pan, now nicely-heated over medium-low heat, add the butter. It’ll melt somewhat slowly, then begin to foam. Once the foam from the melted butter has dissipated, pour in the egg mixture. Using a rubber spatula, stir the eggs until you notice curds starting to form.

This is the point at which your patience will have to be exercised. This step will take a while, but I assure you that it’s well worth it.

Once you see curds starting to form, turn the heat on your burner up to high. Use your spatula to continually fold the eggs toward the center of the pan. Things will happen very quickly, so keep your eye on the ball … err, pan. Once there is no more liquid circling the edge of the pan, remove it from the burner.

It’s very important to note that the eggs will continue to cook somewhat once they’re removed from the stovetop. If they look done in when you’re cooking, they’ll be overdone when you go to eat them.

Transfer the eggs to a shallow bowl and serve. What you and your breakfasteers will have are, quite simply, the best scrambled eggs you’ve ever eaten.

Plain, simple, delicious.

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Photo Credit: stevendpolo