Who is crafty?!!

[Terri Wilson]

What types of crafts and art do you like to do?

[Anna]

I make pasta too. I got a pasta roller at Consignment 1st and we use it all the time. My dd will ONLY eat fresh pasta now - LOL! It's really easy. I think it would be hard to roll it out with a rolling pin but I guess it could be done.

Do you have a cracker recipe that you like? There are some in a Peter Reinhart book that I have but I've not made them yet. I've had some he made at Charlotte Shouts last year and they were yummy.

~Anna

[Cara Yara]

We have a pasta roller/cutter we got from a friend that wasn't using it. We tried it out and made fettucine but we had problems with it getting clumpy. Advice?

Also wondering what types of pasta you make.

Cara

[Meredeth]

I sometimes hand roll it and sometimes use my pasta roller. There is something very satisfying about seeing pasta noodles hanging all around the kitchen.

[Meredeth]

I make fettucine, angel hair (that's what cutters I have) with my pasta maker. But I also like to make ravioli and tortellini.

I would say if you had clumpy problems you may have needed to add a bit of water to your dough. Also it's important to keep a cloth over your dough when not rolling it.

One other thing to try would be to keep rolling through on the fattest setting (usually 0) until it's pretty smooth.

[Anna]

Ours has spaghetti and fettuccine options. I make it with wheat flour or white wheat.

Were your noodles clumping together coming out of the roller? If so, then I'd say the dough was too wet. It needs to be dry to not stick together. I put flour in old shaker jar and shake it over the rolled out dough before each stage. Finding that right moisture balance is the hardest part. I mix my dough in the food processor and find it is still loose when it's ready, if it starts to clump together like you would normally like with other dough, it's too moist. So when it's loose, I transfer to the cutting board and the form it into a ball.

If that's not the clumpy you meant, sorry for that drawn out description :)

~Anna

[Terri Wilson]

Did you have some sort of velcro, snaps, or ribbons to keep them in place?

[Anna]

It's a "wing" design and I used snaps. They also use a "quilting" pattern to keep liquid in the center. I can show you sometime if you'd like. Shall I bring one to MNO - LOL!

Anna

[Terri Wilson]

I would love This.

[Anna]

I love that you would love this!! :) I don't plan to be at the birth meeting but will be at the unschooling MNO on the 22nd and *maybe* Brixx in Nov. That is also dh's motorcycle guy's night out so we will have to see how that shakes out.

Where do you live? We are in South Charlotte, near 485 and Providence Road.

~Anna