Homemade (Extruded) Spaghetti

My mother-in-law sent us an old pasta extruder attachment for our old KitchenAid stand mixer. The package, along with the mixer looks about as old as we are, but was in great shape and of course, I couldn't wait to get researching on a recipe to make my own extruded pasta.

I found that the recipe in the included book was the standard egg, flour, salt, oil pasta recipe one would expect to make any rolled pasta from. I have heard horror stories about how difficult extruders are to operate, clean and ultimately have success with so I really wanted to do some research before sending through an untried recipe.

Turns out there's not a lot of information on the internet on the subject. I guess it really is just that much easier to go to the store and buy spaghetti. I get it and I agree, but I cannot help but see something like this through to the end if nothing else just to have an opinion on the subject.

That being said, I found a few bits of information:

1. DO NOT use the standard egg, flour, salt, oil recipe you've seen everywhere. It won't work as well/at all (I have not tested this, but imagine it would be ok for spaghetti/linguini but bet it wouldn't be super
successful for macaroni)

2. USE SEMOLINA. You must use semolina. Look on your boxes of extruded pasta in the pantry. You should see semolina on every last one. You could do a half AP flour/half semolina recipe but I wanted to try it all semolina before changing variables.

3. USE A BINDER. This was the most confusing part. I found mention of only using water (here) and found some forum post (forgot where) that said to only use eggs. I imagine one could use a combination as well but I really didn't feel like making two or three batches to test the variables. I have kids to attend to, after all.

4. THE DOUGH MUST BE CRUMBLY. I probably saw this most on my research. If you think it's crumbly, add a bit more semolina and mix again. If it's too wet, your pasta will either collapse or stick to itself and cause a giant blob of dough you have to toss out.

So, the post from hungrycravings.com says to only use water, but I was deathly afraid of the pasta falling apart with only water as a binder so when I saw this post from fxcuisine.com that used eggs and actually mentioned ratios of weights, I decided to try it. I figured I'd have the highest chance of success using eggs vs. using only water or a combination of each.

Homemade (Extruded) Spaghetti

(from here)

2 eggs

pinch of salt

equal weight of semolina flour to the eggs & salt (+ a few tablespoons)

A mixer or food processor will make this much easier. 

==

Get your scale out and weigh the eggs and salt. I used grams for accuracy, but you don't have to.

Mine weighed 107 grams, which is 3.78 oz.

Add an equal amount of semolina. Yes, I should have zeroed it out first, but whatever. 

Mix it up in the bowl until you get a dough ball.

I could tell already that I was going to need a power tool for this. It gets dense quick.

Transfer to a mixer or food processor and get to mixing on low speed.

I didn't get the crumbly texture I was hoping for so I added a tablespoon of semolina and remixed.

Better, but still wanted a more crumbly texture so I added another tablespoon.

Finally it broke up into small chunks like I saw in pictures online. Perfect.

Get your attachment on. I doubt you'll have this one but they do make a modern one.

I had no idea how fast or slow this was going to be, so I pre-staged everything.

I got all of the dough into the hopper.

Get a sheet pan covered in flour.

Also, get a pair of scissors if your attachment doesn't have a nice little guillotine.

Turn the mixer to speed and start shoving the dough down towards the screw.

HUZZAH! It works!

I couldn't believe that it was actually working. Not falling apart and working.

I cut them off after about a foot and laid them out on a pan tossing them well with flour.

I did this better by flouring my hands and flouring up each strand as they came out of the machine.

Much better.

Keep pushing the dough into the machine. It will be hard. Keep at it.

Also, your motor may get hot.

Floured hand, floured pasta:

I ended up re-organizing them into a straighter line so they'd dry without breaking.

I was amazed how durable they felt. There wasn't much, if any, breaking of each strand.

You can cook them immediately or let them dry out a bit on a sheet pan. 

==

To cook, just boil as normal. Use salted water.

Try not to stir too much.

Taste often after about 5 minutes. They will be much more toothsome than normal pasta.

Do not overcook this pasta. Right when you feel that it is al dente, get it out of the water. I didn't overcook mine so I don't know what they would turn into. I assume they'd fall apart. Just keep a watchful eye on them and check often.

The texture and flavor of the pasta was top notch. Different and better than any boxed spaghetti I've ever had, hands down. (I ended up making Pasta all'amatriciana here)

Yes, it was more work. Yes, my mixer did not like me for making it work so hard, but the reward was completely worth the extra work.

Enjoy!