Our homemade pasta is perfect for home cooks of all levels, even beginners! This fresh egg pasta dough is perfect for homemade spaghetti, fettuccine, pappardelle, capellini, and lasagna sheets.
Few recipes tug at my heartstrings as much as fresh homemade pasta. First, it’s simple, so if you are wondering if this pasta recipe is for you, stop. You can do it! Second, homemade pasta is ethereally good and makes you feel like a rockstar. Even today, every time I make fresh pasta, I marvel at what I’ve created and feel so accomplished.
The recipe is detailed, and we’ve included a helpful how-to section with photographs to help you along the way. I can’t wait for you to make homemade pasta! For some of my favorite pasta recipes and ways to serve it, look at our homemade pasta sauce, perfect basil pesto, my favorite fettuccine Alfredo, and these exceptionally delicious Italian meatballs with the most delicious sauce.
Key Ingredients
- Flour: Use ’00’ flour (doppio zero flour) for the best texture. It’s commonly used for making pasta and pizza dough, is very finely ground so our pasta turns out smooth, silky, and light. You should be able to find it in your local grocery store as King Arthur Flour and Bob’s Red Mill have recently come out with their own ’00’ flour (sometimes called pizza flour or Italian-style flour). If you cannot find it, use unbleached all-purpose flour. When Cook’s Illustrated tested bleached all-purpose flour vs. unbleached all-purpose flour, they found that bleached all-purpose caused the cooked pasta to have “pitted, pebbly surfaces.” They explain that this is because the bleach weakens the proteins in the dough and makes the starches burst while cooking in the boiling water.
- Eggs: We use whole eggs in this egg-based pasta recipe. If you have access to eggs with super yellow or orange yolks, the pasta will be extra pretty. Pay attention to the weight of your eggs. You need between 220 grams and 228 grams for this recipe. This should be equivalent to 4 large eggs, but if your eggs are on the smaller side, you may need to increase the liquid slightly by adding an egg yolk or some more beaten egg.
- Salt: We add salt to our fresh pasta dough and the water used to cook the pasta.
- Olive Oil: A little olive oil adds a bit of flavor, but more importantly, it adds richness and smoothness to the dough, making it less likely to stick to itself or the pasta machine during the rolling and cutting process.
How to Make Pasta
You’ll need some special equipment for this pasta recipe. You need a pasta sheeter (pasta roller) and pasta cutting attachments (although you can cut the pasta by hand if needed). I have the KitchenAid pasta attachments (that work with my stand mixer), but any pasta roller/cutter will work for this recipe. You will also need baking sheets lined with parchment paper that are lightly floured to prevent the pasta from sticking. And, optionally, a pasta drying rack. While not essential, I find it helpful to dry long noodles like spaghetti and prevent them from sticking together.
Once you have your equipment, making homemade pasta is really easy and, honestly, fun! First, pile your flour onto a clean work surface and make a well that fits your eggs, salt, and olive oil.
Then, use a fork to break the eggs and start whisking, slowly bringing in some flour from the walls of your well. Watch that you don’t break the walls, as the egg mixture will spill out.
When about half of the flour is mixed into the egg, you can put down the fork and use your hands or a bench scraper to bring the remaining flour into the dough. It will look dry at first and as if you’ll never get it to come together, but with some time, it will turn into a shaggy dough.
You will knead the pasta dough for 5 to 10 minutes. As you knead, you’ll slowly start to notice it turning into more of a smooth dough. You’ll know it’s ready if you press your finger into it, and it bounces back. When that happens, we need the dough to rest, so wrap it well so it does not dry out, and set it on the counter for at least 30 minutes.
Okay, it’s time to make pasta! We need to make thin sheets of pasta first. So quarter your dough, take one, and cover the rest. Press or roll the dough quarter into an oval that’s thin enough to fit into the thickest setting on your pasta roller (also called a pasta sheeter). Then, turn it on and guide it through. We will stay on this thickness for 5 to 6 times, which sets us up for success when we go thinner.
We want the sheets to be as uniform as we can get them, so fold the dough lengthwise and run it through the roller. Then, fold it widthwise and roll that through the roller. If your ends are totally off, you can fold the uneven ends into the center (as shown below).
Then, run that through the roller a few times. It doesn’t need to be perfect, but the more uniform you can get, the better. Also, as you are working with the dough, make sure you are dusting both sides with flour almost every time you go through the roller so that it does not stick.
Alright, now we have our first thickness behind us, we can move on to thinner settings. Keeping it lightly dusted with flour, I like to run it through levels #2 and #3 two to three times and then send it through one to two times for levels #4, #5, and #6.
Level #6 is a good all-purpose thickness for linguine, fettuccine, pappardelle, or lasagna sheets. You’ll want to run your pasta sheet through level #7 and possibly #8 for thinner noodles like spaghetti or capellini.
Now that you have your pasta sheet, lightly dust it with flour and set it down, folded in two, on a baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough.
You have many choices for cutting your pasta. You can keep it as sheets and use it for lasagna. Or, you can hand-cut the sheets to make wider noodles like pappardelle (which I love for this mushroom pasta). If you have pasta cutter attachments, you can use those to cut the sheets into your desired style. In our photos, we have used the fettuccine cutter and the photo with a drying rack shows spaghetti.
When you’ve got your noodles, hang them on a drying rack or place small nests of noodles onto a parchment-lined and lightly floured baking sheet. Let the pasta dry until it is no longer sticky before cooking. Or freeze it per our recipe directions. You can cook your homemade pasta from fresh or frozen, instructions are in the recipe.
Essential Homemade Pasta
- PREP
- COOK
- TOTAL
Our homemade pasta dough is perfect for home cooks of all levels, even beginners! We’ve included photos showing the key steps as well as a short, helpful video to guide you (coming soon). Here’s what to keep in mind for pasta success: (1) Accurate measurements are key: For the best results, we highly recommend weighing your flour and eggs. If you don’t have a kitchen scale, we’ve included tips below the recipe for accurately measuring flour by volume to avoid adding too much. (2) Flour is your friend: As you work with the dough—kneading, rolling, and cutting—lightly dust all surfaces of the dough frequently with flour. This will prevent it from sticking to your work surface, pasta machine, or cutters.
Equipment needed: Pasta roller (also called a sheeter), pasta cutter attachments, baking sheets, and a pasta drying rack (optional). Our photos and video use a KitchenAid Stand Mixer with KitchenAid Pasta Attachments.
You Will Need
3 cups (390g) Italian-style “00” flour or unbleached all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
220g to 228g large eggs, approximately 4 large eggs without shell, eggs with rich yellow or orange yolks are best
3/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
Directions
1Pile the flour on a clean work surface. Make a well in the middle and add the eggs, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and 1 tablespoon olive oil.
2Use a fork to rupture the egg yolks and mix in a circular motion, slowly mixing the flour with the eggs while being careful not to break the walls of your well.
3Once about half of the flour is mixed in, use a bench scraper or your hands to bring the rest of the flour and eggs together, working all of the flour in.
4When the dough comes together, lightly flour your work surface and knead it for 5 to 7 minutes or until it is a smooth ball that bounces back slightly when you push a finger into it.
5Wrap the pasta dough with plastic and let it rest at room temperature for 30 minutes to 1 hour.
6Cut the dough into quarters. Grab one of them, and cover the remaining quarters with the plastic wrap.
7Use a rolling pin or your fingers to press the dough into a thin oval that fits through the largest setting on a pasta roller (setting #1).
8Run the dough through the largest setting 5 to 6 times before going to a smaller setting, always ensuring the dough is lightly floured before guiding it through the roller. To make uniform sheets, fold the dough in half lengthwise, then run it through the machine. Then, fold it widthwise before running it through the machine again. If you have uneven ends, you can fold the uneven ends into the center and run it through to even it out (photo provided in article).
9After the thickest setting, continue with thinner settings, always keeping the pasta dough lightly floured as you go. We recommend running the dough through #2 and #3 three times and the rest from #4 to #8 once or twice. Go through each thickness setting until your desired thickness. The higher the number, the thinner the pasta. #6 is a good all-purpose thickness, and #8 is ideal for thin noodles like capellini.
10Give the pasta sheet on both sides another light dusting of flour to prevent sticking, and then fold it over itself and place it onto a floured surface or baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough.
11Choose a pasta cutter attachment and run each sheet through it. If your sheets are very long, cut them to a more manageable length before guiding them through the cutter. Hang your cut pasta noodles on a drying rack or place small nests of noodles onto a parchment-lined and lightly floured baking sheet. Let the pasta dry until it is no longer sticky before cooking.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- To cook the pasta: Bring a pot of salted water to a boil, add the pasta, and cook until tender, with a nice chew (test it after 2 minutes, and continue to cook and test until you are happy). Fresh pasta typically takes between 2 and 5 minutes to cook.
- To store the pasta: Arrange the fresh pasta on a parchment-lined baking sheet in a single layer, either in strands or as little nests. Place the baking sheet into the freezer for 30 minutes or until the pasta is hard, then gently transfer it to a freezer bag or airtight container. Freeze for up to 3 months. Then, when ready to cook, you can cook from frozen.
- Measuring your flour: Measuring flour by weight is best for this recipe. To use volume (cup) measurements, fluff the flour in its container, then gently scoop it into your measuring cup until slightly mounded. Level off the top with a knife for accurate measuring.
- Nutrition facts are estimates.
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