My husband makes amazing spaghetti sauce. It has been one of our standard household meals for almost as long as we've been married (9.5 years). I used to pride myself on making good spaghetti sauce, but he has spent years perfecting his and I just can't even try to compete with it (wouldn't want to). He also adds in delicious meatballs that at one point were probably the size of baseballs, but have shrunk a bit since we have become more health conscious. He's been using leaner beef, too.
So, last night was spaghetti night in the Glanowski household but this time we decided to make it a more cooperative effort. Dan started making the sauce around lunchtime and I was put in charge of making the spaghetti noodles from scratch. We had it timed perfectly so the pasta finished just as the sauce reached its simmering peak of perfection.
I have only newly started making pasta from scratch, and I love the process. It is like magic how a mound of flour and a few eggs can turn into ribbons of delicious noodles. It took me about two hours to make a pound of spaghetti noodles, but that is because I had to let the dough rest for an hour after kneading. I am thinking about giving homemade bread a try just because I think kneading is such a fun, stress-relieving activity. The pasta machine does most of the work for the second round of kneading and then making the pasta sheets thinner and thinner until they are just what you want. My pasta machine also has cutting attachments for both fettucine and spaghetti, and it worked beautifully. A few simple cranks of the handle and I had silky, fine heaps of spaghetti noodles. A quick bath in boiling water (less than half the time of dried pasta) and we ended up with smooth, fresh pasta for our sauce. There is such a difference between fresh and dried pasta--the fresh retains some essential softness even when al dente, and has a slightly different, starchier flavor. It is well worth the effort to make your own.
Our dinner was perfect--a delicious example of teamwork.
So, last night was spaghetti night in the Glanowski household but this time we decided to make it a more cooperative effort. Dan started making the sauce around lunchtime and I was put in charge of making the spaghetti noodles from scratch. We had it timed perfectly so the pasta finished just as the sauce reached its simmering peak of perfection.
I have only newly started making pasta from scratch, and I love the process. It is like magic how a mound of flour and a few eggs can turn into ribbons of delicious noodles. It took me about two hours to make a pound of spaghetti noodles, but that is because I had to let the dough rest for an hour after kneading. I am thinking about giving homemade bread a try just because I think kneading is such a fun, stress-relieving activity. The pasta machine does most of the work for the second round of kneading and then making the pasta sheets thinner and thinner until they are just what you want. My pasta machine also has cutting attachments for both fettucine and spaghetti, and it worked beautifully. A few simple cranks of the handle and I had silky, fine heaps of spaghetti noodles. A quick bath in boiling water (less than half the time of dried pasta) and we ended up with smooth, fresh pasta for our sauce. There is such a difference between fresh and dried pasta--the fresh retains some essential softness even when al dente, and has a slightly different, starchier flavor. It is well worth the effort to make your own.
Our dinner was perfect--a delicious example of teamwork.
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