Freezing Instructions
You can freeze the pasta dough ball for up to 1 month, defrosting overnight in the refrigerator before bringing to room temperature and rolling out. Or you can freeze your noodles in single-serving bundles on a baking sheet, then transfer to a plastic freezer bag. Frozen noodles can be cooked in the boiling water, but the cooking time will be about 2 minutes longer.
VARIATIONS
Herb Egg Pasta
Add 2 tablespoons minced flat-leaf parsley, 2 tablespoons minced fresh basil, and 2 table spoons minced fresh marjoram to the flour in the bread pan. Use milk in place of the warm water. This pasta is excellent with cheese sauces such as
fonduta
, with ricotta and parsley, and with olive oil sauces.
Black Pepper Egg Pasta
Add 1 heaping tablespoon of finely ground black pepper to the flour in the bread pan. This pasta is very good with vegetable, tomato, and butter sauces.
WHOLE WHEAT EGG PASTA
Makes 1
1
/
2
pounds pasta, 7 to 8 servings
T
his pasta is excellent with vegetable, sausage, tomato, and cheese sauces, like gorgonzola.
1
1
/
2
- OR 2-POUND-LOAF MACHINES
4 large eggs, lightly beaten, at room temperature
3 tablespoons warm water
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat or whole grain spelt flour
1 teaspoon salt
Follow the step-by-step directions for
Egg Pasta
beginning.
GREEN SPINACH PASTA
Makes 1
1
/
2
pounds pasta, 7 to 8 servings
T
his pasta is excellent with tomato sauces and cream sauces.
T
1
1
/
2
- OR 2-POUND-LOAF MACHINES
1
/
2
pound fresh spinach, washed
3 large eggs, lightly beaten, at room temperature
1 tablespoon olive oil
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
Place the spinach in a food processor fitted with the metal blade. Process to a puree. Remove the spinach and place in a small mesh strainer over a small bowl. Press out 2 to 3 tablespoons spinach juice. Reserve 3 tablespoons spinach puree.
Follow the step-by-step directions for
Egg Pasta
beginning, adding 2 tablespoons of the spinach juice and 3 tablespoons of the puree with the wet ingredients in Step 1. Adjust the texture of the dough ball using the reserved spinach juice.
SEMOLINA PASTA
Makes 1
1
/
2
pounds pasta, 7 to 8 servings
T
his pasta is very good with all tomato sauces, with meatballs, with vegetable sauces such as pureed broccoli, with cream sauces such as
balsamella,
and for baked pasta dishes.
1
1
/
2
- OR 2-POUND-LOAF MACHINES
7
/
8
cup warm water
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cups unbleached all-purpose or bread flour
1 cup semolina pasta flour
1 teaspoon salt
Follow the step-by-step directions for
Egg Pasta
beginning.
EARTH’S BOUNTY
Whole Wheat, Whole-Grain,
and Specialty Flour Breads
Light Whole Wheat Bread
Honey Whole Wheat Bread
Buttermilk Whole Wheat Bread
Soft Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls
Lou’s Daily Bread
Healthy Whole Wheat Challah
Old-Fashioned Sesame-Wheat Bread
Toasted Sesame—Whole Wheat Bread
Three-Seed Whole Wheat Bread
Irish Potato Brown Bread
Flax Seed Whole Wheat Bread
Dakota Bread
Harper’s Loaf
Whole Wheat Crescent Dinner Rolls
100% Whole Wheat Bread
Tecate Ranch Whole Wheat Bread
White Whole Wheat Bread
Spelt Bread
Cracked Wheat Bread
Graham Bread
Scandinavian Light Rye
Swedish Rye Bread
Limpa
Bohemian Black Bread
Sour Cream Rye
Polish Beer Rye Bread
Sunflower Pumpernickel Rye
Cracked Rye Bread
Cornmeal Honey Bread
Cornmeal and Hominy Bread
Polenta-Sunflower-Millet Bread
Orange-Buckwheat Bread
Buckwheat-Millet Bread
Chestnut Flour Bread
Polenta-Chestnut Bread
Barley Bread
Cornell Bread
Millet and Potato Long Rolls
Quinoa Bread
Teff Honey Bread
Chickpea Flour Bread
Brown Rice Flour Bread
Wild Rice Bread
Gluten-Free and Low-Gluten Breads
Gluten-Free Cinnamon Raisin Bread
Gluten-Free Mock Light Rye
Gluten-Free Ricotta Potato Bread
Gluten-Free Buttermilk White Bread
Gluten-Free Chickpea-, Rice-, and Tapioca-Flour Bread
Low-Gluten White Spelt Bread
Gluten-Free Almond and Dried Fruit Holiday Bread
Three-Grain Bread
Whole-Grain Daily Bread
Honey Wheat Berry Bread
Sprouted Wheat Berry Bread
Graham Indian Bread
Sennebec Hill Bread
Stonehenge Bread
Nine-Grain Honey Bread
Zo’s 14-Grain Bread
Super-Grain Bread
M
ention whole grain bread and one of the following images might spring to mind: heavy, dry, tooth-breaker. Any experienced baker knows there is some truth to each of those images, but in reality, whole grain breads can be hearty in flavor and still light textured. Whole wheat breads are part of a genre known as whole grain breads because whole wheat flours are ground from all the parts of the grain. A 100 percent whole wheat bread may be the quintessential whole grain loaf, a loaf that every baker wants to master, but there is room for the hand of creativity in whole wheat breads, too. They can be made with all different proportions of whole wheat flour, from a few table spoons to 50 or 75 percent. Differences in the grinds of different brands of flour also contribute slightly different textures to whole wheat breads. You will have your favorite brands of flour and will use them over and over again, but by varying the types you use, you can get a wider variety of whole wheat breads.
There are fine, medium, and coarse grinds of whole wheat flour. Which one you use can make a big difference in how your bread turns out. Unless you order from a specialty mill, like Giusto’s, though, bags of whole wheat flour are not generally labeled by their grind. This means that you have to buy different flours and figure out what grinds you have by looking at them and feeling them. In fine flour, all the parts of the grain—the germ, the bran, and the endosperm—are equally ground. It feels smooth. The finest grind of whole wheat flour makes a moist, fine-textured, but dark-colored and rich-flavored, bread. Coarse and medium grinds disperse the bran and germ throughout the flour. You can easily see and feel them. The larger the pieces of bran, the coarser the flour. The coarser the flour, the coarser the crumb will be and the heavier the finished loaf, because the sharp edges of the bran tend to cut the thin strands of stretchy gluten during rising. I note the grinds of various brands in the margin of my workbooks with comments like “Gold Medal, medium grind” or “Stone Buhr, coarse grind.” Many of my recipes in this book specify what grind of whole wheat to use in order to assure the best possible loaf.