I’m currently keto (hence all of the meat posts), but for just one day I wasn’t…thanks Marcato, Mary and Mario…

Yes, it’s tough to imagine but I’ve been eating (more or less) a keto diet since December and to date I’m down 32lb even. I only have another 28lb to reach my goal…not sure if that’s a positive or not! Anyway, as you most likely know, a keto diet mainly consists of eating lots of good fats, an average amount of protein (don’t judge the content of this blog) and minimal carbs.

As a lover of bread and pasta (although my wife would put me to shame in this category – nobody loves pasta more than she does!), it’s been a tricky situation navigating the food landscape in recent times. Especially as I like to be the cook at home…let me tell you that there’s nothing quite like making white bread sandwiches for my kids lunches or sitting next to my family during a movie watching them chow down a bag of sour cream and onion chips. Life literally doesn’t get any more depressing.

Anyway, since I hit my 50% marker I decided to let up for a week or three. I didn’t let the wheels fall off too much but I did succumb to making pasta with my kids for the first time and more critically eating it!

My first shout-out goes to Leah (again). She supplied me with a Mario Batali recipe book which had a fantastic fresh pasta recipe, which my kids and I had a ton of fun following. For reference, it went something like this…

…on a chopping board mound 3 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour and add 5 eggs to a well in the middle. Use a fork to beat the eggs and then begin to incorporate the flour, starting with the inner rim. Retain the outer rim as best as possible as you work the dough together. Once half of the flour is combined begin to knead it into a cohesive mass. Discard any remaining scraps. Lighting flour the board and then continue to knead for a further ten minutes. The dough should remain elastic and somewhat sticky. Wrap in cling film and let rest for 30 minutes once complete. Cut the dough into 4 quarters, retaining three of them in cling film. Do not re-knead. Setup pasta machine. Set at “no.0”. Flatten the first portion to in your palms and feed through the machine. Fold it in thirds and then pass it through once again. Repeat this five times. Then move the knob to “no.1”. Pass through another five times following the same process. Turn the knob to “no.2”. Pass it through three times this time. You may find you need to cut the pasta in half during this process if it gets too long to handle. Also, dust the pasta with flour as needed to avoid it sticking. Continue passing the pasta dough through the machine until you reach your desired thickness. There is no need to fold in thirds during these last few passes. I found “no.5” is good for fettuccine, and “no.7” for Tagliolini, but please yourselves as you work through things. When ready switch to passing the pasta through the cutter. When passing it through ensure you’re gentle with the dough, using your palm to catch it each time. Setup a drying rack to hang pasta over once cut (see photo for reference). It’s important to let it rest for a little while before cooking. Once ready, cook the pasta in salted rolling-boil water for anywhere between 1-5 minutes depending upon thickness. Add sauce/butter/cheese etc as necessary.

My second shout-out goes to Marcato (marcato.it), who manufactured the sublime Marcato Atlas 150 pasta machine. What a gorgeous piece of equipment it is. In many ways it’s like an Italian sports car, in that it’s a real looker, but in contrast it’s unlike an Italian sports car in that it’s yet to stop working…

My third and final shout-out goes to my grandmother who kindly purchased the white kettle in the adjacent photo, without which we would have had no way to fashion a pasta drying station! Thank you Mary!