Homemade Pasta…You can do it

I have said in previous posts that I had a good pasta recipe, well it is time I shared it.  You would think that growing up in a large Italian family that I would prepare homemade pasta all the time. I should, but I don’t. It really is a simple process, however, like a lot of moms out there, I am busy and I fall all too often to the convenience of store bought foods. In this post, I am going to share my recipe for pasta from scratch. I pair it with whatever sauce I am in the mood for. It goes well with tomatoes or cream sauces.

The recipe calls for:

2 cups of Semolina flour…If you can’t find Semolina, all-purpose flour works too

2 eggs

1 teaspoon of salt

2 tablespoons of milk… whatever you have on hand, I tend to use 2% milk

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To begin, I mix the flour and salt together. Then sift onto your work surface. This is going to get a bit messy so a nice clean spot for kneading the dough is needed.

Into the flour, I make a volcano shape…to this add the 2 eggs and milk to the center

Then beat the eggs and milk together inside of the flour volcano. As you beat them slowly work in the flour.

After you have whisked the eggs and milk, you begin to pull flour from the sides into the middle. 

Flour volcano with eggs

Whisk together the eggs and milk

Pulling dough into the middle

 

 As the dough comes together, you can begin to knead it into a ball. I then refrigerate the ball of dough for roughly 10 minutes or so. The chilled dough is easier to work with.

Rolled dough

 Roll the chilled dough to a thin, pizza crust, like size. After this, roll the dough into a tube. From there, you can cut the noodles into your preferred shape by slicing the rolled dough. This makes a Fettuccini type noodle.

Rolled and cutting

drying noodles

 After cutting,  let your noodles dry for 2 hours. I spread mine out on my cutting board and leave them be. It’s a hard thing to do, because you just know they are going to taste so good but drying them firms up the dough and allows the magic of the ingredients to come together and meld. 

Too cook the noodle; simply boil in a salted pot of water for a couple of minutes. It does not take long to become al dente, then top with your favorite sauce. You can even add this pasta to your favorite soup recipes.   If you decide to tryout the recipe, I would love comments on how you thought it came out and what you topped your pasta with. 

Enjoy : )

Directions without all the pictures: 

-To begin, I mix the flour and salt together. Then sift onto your work surface. This is going to get a bit messy so a nice clean spot for kneading the dough is needed.

Into the flour, I make a volcano shape…to this add the 2 eggs and milk to the center

- Then beat the eggs and milk together inside of the flour volcano. As you beat them slowly work in the flour. As the dough comes together, you can begin to knead it into a ball. I then refrigerate the ball of dough for roughly 10 minutes or so. The chilled dough is easier to work with.

-Roll the chilled dough to a thin, pizza crust, like size. After this, roll the dough into a tube. From there, you can cut the noodles into your preferred shape by slicing the rolled dough. This makes a Fettuccini type noodle.  

- After cutting,  let your noodles dry for 2 hours. I spread mine out on my cutting board and leave them be. It’s a hard thing to do, because you just know they are going to taste so good but drying them firms up the dough and allows the magic of the ingredients to come together and meld.

-Too cook the noodle; simply boil in a salted pot of water for a couple of minutes. It does not take long to become al dente, then top with your favorite sauce. You can even add this pasta to your favorite soup recipes.   

Down on the Farm... On Iron Oak Farm

I am lucky enough to live not far from some great people who let me play on their farm and when the need to smell a barn strikes me, they even let me go inside. My need to smell barns probably stems from my favorite earliest childhood memories of visiting my grandfather’s barn.  It is just something about the smell of hay and animals that take me back. I really can’t get enough. Strange, I know.  

Tonight, I was lucky enough to take in some haying being done out on the farm with my 9 year old son. As we pulled in the smell of the sweet cut grass was the first thing that I noticed.  From our view in the drive way we could already see my friends in the back acres picking up hay bales using their trusty old tractor affectionately called Ruby. I am not sure, but I don’t think Aaron was quite as excited as I was about the prospect of haying. He did however scope out their pool and I knew he found his bliss. 

Turkey Pullets

First thing I like to do once I get to their farm is check out how all the animals are doing. They always have something new and exciting going on, whether it is baby goats and bottle feedings,  breeding certain chicken breeds or getting a flock of heritage breed turkeys, there is always something new to see.  I love the turkeys that they have this year. It is easy to see the resemblance to dinosaurs. They move so much like the raptors in the movie Jurassic Park. I cannot wait to see how big they get. Baby animals and poultry are great. I mean who doesn’t love the babies, but there is also something very cool about a big ol’ fat hen or tom turkey…or chicken for that matter. I just love them. 

My boy walked through the barn, he really liked their Nubian goats, and then quickly found the pool. I mean, it was a hot end of June day so I can understand. I, on the other hand, jumped at the chance to catch a ride out into the hay field and learn all about the baler they were using to bale their hay. It was incredibly cool to watch the equipment make nice tidy bales from the rows of mowed down hay. Shoot, the baler, even tied the twine around the bales. Not that I think this is by any means an easy day at the office, baling hay, is for sure a back breaking thing that farmers need to get done on the hot dry days so they do not lose much hay to moisture and rot. 

My Boy on a hay bale

My farmer friends even let me take home a piece of the farm. I got to raid their garden and pick myself a large bowl of salad greens and a zucchini. There was a white carrot for dicing, but it never made it back to my house. My dearest little one ate it while still at their farm sitting in my car. I must admit, I am completely jealous that they already have fruits and veggies to harvest.  My poor little garden is starting to get flowers so things are moving in the right direction, but definitely not ready to bear a product that is for sure. 

My Harvest ; )

It was a great way to spend a summer evening. Call me cheesy, crazy, nerdy or maybe a dork, but I really do enjoy my field trips to the farm.

Under Construction

After thinking and thinking about the direction I really want this blog to go in, I have come to the conclusion that the housewife thing was not really cutting it with me. I am a housewife and I do love the job but mostly, I am just a country girl. I have old fashion values when it comes to raising my boys and taking care of my Husband and home but I think my life experiences and philosophies on life really boil down to the country girl in me.  Please excuse my dust…   And without further ado… Drum Roll Please…  I am renaming and reinventing this little blog…

Musings of a Mom and Scattered Blogger

This blog has gone in no direction that I thought it would go. I had big plans of sharing recipes and my tips on gardening, instead, I have written mostly thoughts about my life. Each entry is filled with my need to live a simple life, getting back to basics and appreciating the things that matter most.  Well, this entry is not veering too far from that either.  Bear with this gal, as I fumble my way through pulling this blog together to some sort of cohesive space. 

So this morning, I was repacking my cooler and snack tote of goodies for our second day in a baseball tournament for the oldest boy. Waffles will be on the breakfast menu today, I believe. I haven’t actually started cooking because the need to write out this thought struck me and I hit the computer to jot it down.  The house is quiet, Im enjoying coffee before the kids hit the floor running. We have an extra kid for the night, a friend of my youngest son, a friendship foraged at baseball parks and football fields. 

I know this generation of kids is far advanced in technology and video games. They will probably go down as the video game generation, even though, I played Nintendo a time or two growing up myself. It’s this generation where obesity rates are high and people believe kids no longer enjoy the outdoors. Sure, there are some who would rather spend hours playing mock war on the gaming systems but there are so many who do enjoy being outside. I have come to this conclusion as I was watching the oldest boys double header baseball games yesterday. Tournaments are intense. These boys go on the field to play ball and winning is what they are all after. Each time at bat is a battle.  They sweat in the heat standing in the outfield waiting to make that perfect catch. Their uniforms are muddied from sliding into third. The crowds are cheering. It’s never quiet at a ball game and off in the distance, in a small patch of grass between ball diamonds is a group of kids playing pickle. They are the younger brothers and sometimes sisters of the athletes on the field. They are laughing, having a grand time running around outdoors. They are wading in mud puddles and taking turns seeing who can spit sunflower seeds the farthest. These are kids who may not go to the same elementary school but they are building friendships all the same. 

At my house, after the games at the fields have all ended, the kids come home to eat and shower but they do not stay still long, soon they have called over some friends. Wiffle ball is played in my yard until it’s too dark to see the ball. It is then that the computers fire up and video games get turned on. There is still hope in the younger generation.  It warms my heart to know that fun is still being had on American baseball fields and backyards, that friendships foraged with bonds of dirt and mud puddles still exist, and that kids still enjoy sitting under a tree and sharing a snack. I love that athletes are still battling it out on fields across the world and younger siblings are looking up to those athletes and wanting to be just like them. I love that when the street lights come on, there are still moms out there yelling for their kids to wrap up a game and to come inside. It is part of what life is all about, the simple enjoyment of it all. Maybe next post I will blog about my homemade pasta recipe. It is really simple, but the troops are starting to wake and breakfast needs to hit the table.

It's That Time of Year

My Baby at Pitching Practice

Baseball season, it is my busiest time of year. Both of my boys play baseball so there is a lot of running from practice to practice, game to game, and some traveling to tournaments on the weekends just for good measure.  I scrub jerseys, to free the knees from the grass stains and red dirt that mark a well-played game. We hunt for the elusive “cups” that somehow seem to leave the sliding shorts and get lost as soon as we are home from a practice or game. Shoot, who needs dryer eating socks; I have a house that eats athletic supporters. 

Baseball also means the end of the school year is fast approaching. We have 5 more weeks left here in our little school district. Where did this school year go? I swear I just packed their backpacks with all the shiny new school supplies that were so painstakingly picked out. Their fresh shoes that we spent hours picking out just the right pair…have been discarded as too small and too worn out. Jeans are starting to get the high in the ankle look. The school year is ending and their jeans are a testament to how much they have grown. 

My Spring Wreath and Gardening Gnome

Five weeks left in the school year puts us just about the time to start planting the garden.  I had been planning to do some raised beds this year. I just like the look of them for my small town backyard garden. However, I have been a compost queen and I spent some time outside turning my dirt and noticing how wonderfully dark and rich it has become. I may just have to sow directly into the ground. So many decisions, Spring, or as we refer to it as Baseball Season, has so much work to do. So many things to get done. How is someone supposed to live simple?  Well simple does not always meaning not busy does it? I have certainly come to that conclusion. It is the simple thought that I am practicing this seasons. Spend time with my family and plant a garden. In the moments I want to feel overwhelmed with it all, I am just reminding myself that these are the times that matter. My children love to eat from a garden and they will grow up to remember the garden we planted year after year. They will, hopefully, look back on the memories of baseball and the friendships gained on the field with awesome nostalgia. Actually, to think of it, my oldest is in 7^th grade, I am still friends with the people I was friends with in 7^th grade.  So, as the kids grow and look back, may they all laugh about the summer before 8^th grade while they sit around a campfire when they are 30. I hope their kids are playing baseball in a backyard somewhere while they are at it. 

Garlic has sprung

Now, I just have to remember to breathe slow, deep, breaths and laugh and I will make it through just fine. A glass of wine probably won't hurt either. 

Sisters

A dear friend of mine has 3 brilliant, funny, beautiful girls. She has recently found out that she is expecting a fourth baby later this year. Her girls remind of what I imagine sisters to be like. I don’t have sisters. For the most part, I come from a family of boys. Boys, Boys, Boys everywhere, really. My mom has a sister and even though they are 10 years apart in age, they are so very close. My aunt and my mom may have busy lives and children, grandchildren and even a great grandchild in the mix, but they still talk on the phone or drop by for visits with each other regularly. My dad has lots of sisters and I know growing up he felt a sense of protectiveness over them all even though he is one of the youngest in the bunch. I know his family dynamic was different. His relationship with his sisters was not the same as between the sisters themselves. 

Jessie and I, circa 1983ish lol

Why am I having such a need to write about sisters? I have a cousin, Jessie. She is the closest thing I have to a sister. She lived with us at times, growing up. We stayed up late at night giggling because we shared a room. We argued in a way that I think only sisters can. She always had my back growing up and I would have done anything for her, still would. We definitely got into our fair share of trouble, but almost all of my memories growing up include her, whether good or bad. I cannot count the times we have laughed and cried with each other. When things happen in my life, she is the one I think of first to tell. She knows me, in my soul, she knows who I am and where I come from. Jessie knows I hated getting up early to have to take the first shower in our one bathroom house and she knows that while I may present a tough exterior, she knows I have a marshmallow heart.  

Baseball anyone?

Baseball season has started and it is one of those times of year that I miss her the most. Jessie, ten years ago or so, left me behind in Michigan and moved to Florida. It has been good for her and her family and I am so proud of where she is in life...  But, holidays and baseball season are when I miss her the most.  We have children that are around the same age, boys of course, and they all play ball. I wish she was here freezing alongside me at practices. Cheering and ducking fly balls. Call me crazy but I envision this still taking place in Michigan, even though I’m sure her sons last baseball practices in Florida did not involve all the moms bundled in sleeping bags and the kids in sweatshirts and layers. I would love to cheer her boys on. I do from the wonderful family connector, Facebook.

So, sisters, not everyone has one. I am sure it is a complicated relationship on so many levels. I just honestly don’t know for sure. I do know, having been blessed with a close cousin, that it is a wonderful relationship even in all its complicated-ness.  Having brothers is no less wonderful, just different.  To bring this post back to my mantra of Back to Basics, living simple… enjoy your family, brothers or sisters. Don’t take anyone or moment for granted.