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    Home » Recipes » All Recipes

    Basic and Flavored Pastas

    Published: Sep 10, 2021

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    How to Make Basic and Flavored Pastas

    Originally published February 14, 2013. Updated on 9/10/2021

    A parchment lined baking sheet with mounds of red, white, and green coloured fresh linguini on it.

    Basic and Flavored Pastas! Homemade Pasta is endlessly customizable, here's my basic guide. Consider it a starting point, have fun with it!

    Homemade pasta may sound fancy and exotic at first, but it's actually quite easy - and can be fun, too!

    When we recently purchased a pasta machine, we went a bit nuts with it, churning out 7 different pasta doughs the first afternoon.

    SO much easier to run them through a machine, than to roll it with a pin.

    Anyway, here's the thing - because so many different things - humidity, the type of flour, etc - can affect how your pasta turns out, it's the kind of thing that doesn't need a real "recipe", per se.

    You can more or less wing it, so long as you keep the basic concepts in mind.

    I’m intending this blog entry as a bit of an overview and inspiration, and hope you use it as a springboard for whatever wild pasta idea you come up with!

    First off, at its very basic, pasta is just flour and eggs.

    Mix the two ingredients together, knead it for about 10 minutes, let it rest for 30 minutes, and then.. you play.

    That's it! Simple, right? Well, you’ll want to keep some things in mind...

    A parchment lined baking sheet with mounds of red, white, and green coloured fresh linguini on it.

    Homemade Pasta Ingredients

    First, let's take a closer look at those ingredients.

    Flour for Making Pasta

    We tend to just use all-purpose flour, as we always have a ton of it on hand... but that's not your only option.

    Many people will cut the all-purpose flour with some semolina flour, or use ONLY semolina flour.

    If you want to get fancy with it, you can substitute other flours for part of the flour (you'll want some regular gluten - I'll experiment with gluten-free pastas another time!).

    Oat flour, millet, barley - each will bring a unique taste and texture to your finished pasta.

    Eggs

    Use fresh, good quality, large eggs.

    A close up view of a mound of fresh roasted red pepper linguini.

    Flavour Ingredients for Making Fresh Pasta

    Now, in addition to those two ingredients, you can add other stuff to flavor it - usually in paste or dried form.

    Some ideas:

    Finely Ground Pesto

    “Finely” being key here. Chunks of nuts will not go through the pasta machine well, so you want it a fine paste!

    Your best option is to Make your own pesto, and just skip the nuts entirely.

    Vegetables

    Think beets, winter squash, garlic, peppers, carrots. Roast them, peel them, and puree them into a fine paste.

    Note: Roasting is important for two reasons.

    First off, you need them soft enough to puree.

    Secondly, roasting cooks with dry heat. You don’t want to boil your beets, squash, sweet potatoes, etc... as that’ll add liquid to it.

    This will screw with your proportions, when making the pasta!

    A close up view of a mound of fresh homemade linguini.

    Dried Herbs and Spices

    Dried herbs and spices can be added to either of the above, for more complex flavors.

    Try roasted red peppers with a little bit of cayenne or smoked paprila, for instance!

    Leafy Greens

    Spinach can be boiled or microwaved for a few minutes, strained VERY well - ideally squeezed out! - and then pureed... but think of the other possibilities!

    Beet greens, kale, mustard greens - when used sparingly - can produce interesting flavors as well!

    A close up view of a mound of fresh spinach linguini.

    Making Flavoured Pasta

    Now, on to how to combine them. (Actual recipes follow at the end of the post!)

    First off, I like to start with about 1 egg for every ¾ - 1 cup of flour.

    As far as flavors go, I usually aim for about ¼ cup of pureed flavor for every 1 ½ - 2 cups of flour in the basic recipe, and then add a bit of extra flour to make up for the additional moisture from the paste.

    Sometimes, I'll reduce the amount of egg, rather than add flour.

    Like I said - you can kinda wing it.

    A parchment lined baking sheet with mounds of red, white, and green coloured fresh linguini on it.

    Pasta Machines!

    As far as equipment goes, you CAN roll this out on a flat surface, using a rolling pin. I find that frustrating, so I use THIS set on my stand mixer.

    I also had one of these standalone pasta makers, before I got the set for my stand mixer.

    Would wholeheartedly recommend either of those, depending on your needs/situation/budget for it!


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    A parchment lined baking sheet with mounds of red, white, and green coloured fresh linguini on it.

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    Before you chow down, be sure to take some pics of your handiwork! If you Instagram it, be sure to tag me - @CelebrationGenerationCA - or post it to My Facebook Page - so I can cheer you on!

    Also, be sure to subscribe to my free monthly email newsletter, so you never miss out on any of my nonsense.

    Well, the published nonsense, anyway!

    A close up view of a mound of fresh roasted red pepper linguini.

    A parchment lined baking sheet with mounds of red, white, and green coloured fresh linguini on it.
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    Basic and Flavoured Pastas

    Pasta is endlessly customizable, here's my basic guide - consider it a starting point, and have fun with it!
    Prep Time15 mins
    Cook Time5 mins
    Resting time30 mins
    Total Time50 mins
    Course: Appetizer, Main Course
    Cuisine: Italian
    Servings: 4 Per variety below
    Calories: 404kcal
    Author: Marie Porter
    Cost: $10

    Equipment

    Pasta Maker (Optional)

    Ingredients

    My Basic Pasta Recipe

    • 3+ Cups Flour
    • 4 Large Eggs

    My Spinach Pasta Recipe

    • 5 oz Fresh Baby Spinach Steamed, strained well, then pureed
    • 2 Cups Flour
    • 2 Large Eggs

    My Beet Pasta Recipe

    • 2 Small Beets Roasted, Peeled, then Pureed
    • 3 Cups Flour
    • 3 Large Eggs

    My Pesto Pasta Recipe

    • ½ Cup Pesto Finely pureed - ideally without nuts.
    • 2+ Cups Flour
    • 2 Large Eggs

    Instructions

    • Once you have ingredients figured out, it’s just a matter of pulling them together into a dough. There are three main ways you can do this:
      1. By hand. Stir your wet ingredients into the flour, use your hands to knead it into a dough.
      2. By stand mixture: Dump everything in the bowl of your stand mixture, attach a dough hook, and let it do its thing.
      3. In a food processor. Put all the ingredients into a food processor, let it rip.
      For any of these three methods, you should adjust ingredients as you go. Once it comes together, pinch a piece of dough. If it’s sticky, add a little flour and blitz again, adjusting as necessary. When dough feels soft and a little moist, without actually being sticky, you’re good to go!
    • Dump dough out onto a floured surface, knead for 2-5 minutes, (~10 if not using a mixer or food processor) until soft and elastic.
    • Shape the dough into a ball. Cover with plastic wrap and allow it to rest for 30 minutes, to relax the gluten.
    • Once time is up, run it through your pasta machine, following the manufacturer’s directions. Once your pasta is ready, boil it in a pot of salted water for a few minutes, and serve it however you’d like.

    Notes

    So there you go, a basic pasta overview. Expect a few fancier pasta recipes, coming up! (Ravioli and tortellini! Yum!)

    Nutrition

    Calories: 404kcal | Carbohydrates: 72g | Protein: 15g | Fat: 5g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Cholesterol: 164mg | Sodium: 64mg | Potassium: 161mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 1g | Vitamin A: 238IU | Calcium: 39mg | Iron: 5mg

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    Marie Porter


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