Use Your Noodle II - Recap

Alton contemplates a pull down world map, wondering if there is a noodle dish common to all cultures. He answers himself by citing Poland’s pierogi, China’s wonton, Japan’s pot stickers and others: the vareniki of Ukraine, the Jewish kreplach and the Korean mandu, Siberia’s pelmeni and Italy’s ravioli. All of them are filled noodle dumplings.

A legend holds that Marco Polo brought noodles from China, but at that time the Romans had been enjoying them for centuries. Some ideas happen spontaneously, and the filled dumpling was simply an idea whose time had come. Today, it comes to your kitchen and to... Good Eats! Alton tries to spear a ravioli but the map stands between him and the noodle, leading him to mutter a discouraged, “Oh, bother!”

Because the show is a half hour long, Alton proposes to bypass some of the lesser known varieties and stick with what Americans love best. That starts with ravioli. Extruded pasta is a mixture of semolina, a flour made from hard durum wheat, and water. Ravioli requires fresh pasta that contains fats: eggs and oil. Alton starts with a mixtue of eggs, water and a little olive oil. Measuring flour into a workspace he forms a kind of bowl from it – a mound of flour with a hollow pit. Then he adds a little egg mixture to the put and uses two fingers to spin it around, supporting the wall by gently pushing toward the middle. With this technique Alton gradually works the wet ingredients into the dry. One might do this with a food processor, but according to Alton that would be the “sissy” way of mixing the dough.

When the dough is a firm paste Alton wraps it in plastic and forms it into a flattened disc. That goes into the refrigerator for an hour’s rest, during which the flour particles hydrate. Cooks tempted to rush past this step are advised not to.

While his dough hydrates, Alton visits Cook’s Warehouse in Atlanta to discover how to roll out the dough. He first examines traditional rolling pins, but these take a lot of work and skill. Next he moves to noodle rolling machines, demonstrating with a pointed finger where the cook places the dough. At that moment W appears and with a turn of the crank traps Alton’s finger in the mechanism! Then she takes the crank from the machine and walks to the other end of the shelf where she demonstrates desirable features: a clearly indexed spacing knob helps the cook roll the dough to the right thickness for the recipe. A removable cutter makes the machine more versatile; with this it can cut fettuccini and other sorts of noodles. A wider machine allows the cook to process the dough faster; since the dough gets harder to work as it sets up the wider machine saves effort at the later stages of the process. A pastry brush works well to clean the machine, and cooks who expect to make a lot of noodles should purchase a machine with an optional motor attachment.

W walks back to Alton and archly informs him that her people were making noodles when Rome was a mule stop in the Tiber. Alton concedes the point but suggests that it is material for another show. Unsatisfied, W decamps with the crank leaving Alton’s finger trapped. Alton drags the shelf along behind him in futile pursuit.

Back in the kitchen Alton attempts to secure his dough roller to the counter with a clamp. Unsuccessful, he ponders the problem and then gets out an ironing board, a couple of metal mending strips and some screws. With these he secures the roller to one end of the board and carries the assembly outside where the whether is conducive to pasta production.

To prepare Alton removes any jewelry that might catch the fragile rolled pasta. Then he flours the board and cuts his dough into halves and shapes each half into a bar. He sends the bar through the roller on the widest setting, then folds it into thirds (like a wallet) and turns it ninety degrees. He repeats this process twice more to knead the dough. Now he’s ready to start the actual rolling. He sets the machine to #2 (that’s where the well graduated wheel comes in) and runs the dough through. He moves the wheel to the next thinner setting and sends the dough through again, repeating this process until he has reached setting #7 and the dough is very thin and almost as long as the board.

With a yardstick, Alton makes an indentation down the middle of the dough’s long axis. Then he spoons filling every couple of inches onto one side of this mark – but what filling should he use?

Any mixture that won’t give off liquid will work as filling. Alton chooses some leftover Good Eats meatloaf mix to which he adds some grated cheese, a little vinegar and some oregano. He stirs that and drops a teaspoon every few inches. Then he prepares to close the ravioli with glue. The glue Alton selects is the time honored egg wash: a mixture of eggs and water. The high protein content will “cement” the edges of the noodle together. Alton applies the wash with a foam trim roller. One stripe goes just inside that center mark, and another along the far edge. Smaller stripes go between each teaspoon of meat. Then Alton carefully folds the noodle over. This is the most important part of the construction. The crucial step is to force as much air out of the ravioli as possible and to crimp the edges together so the glue can grab them. Carelessness here causes the pasta to “blow up” when they’re cooked. Satisfied with his work, Alton lays his pasta on a metal half sheet and freezes them for three hours, then bags and tags them.

To cook the pasta, Alton adds water to a large pot, then a few pinches of salt and some oil. Wait – didn’t Alton caution that oil wouldn’t help pasta cook on an earlier show? Yes, but here the oil acts to reduce the surface tension of the water and prevent boil over. Alton adds ten or so of the ravioli at a time – too many would cool the water and cause them to cook poorly. There’s no need to thaw them; just toss them in. When they float, they’re done. (Trapped air and steam with a lower density than water make the stuffed treats float.) When they finish cooking Alton removes them to a bowl with a little oil to prevent sticking. He debates using a sauce and decides instead to fry them. Heating a skillet with a little butter, Alton waits until the butter foams and just starts to brown, then fries the ravioli with a little sage and black pepper until they’re just coated.

For his tortellini recipe Alton demonstrates how to make pasta by hand, for those lacking a noodle roller. First he kneads the dough for eight to ten minutes, using a stool to get “above” his work so he can put his weight into it. The dough should be smooth and plastic without being dry. Then he wraps and rests the dough as before.

Dividing the dough into four pieces, Alton flours a work surface and make each piece into a “snake” by rolling it. When the snake is a half inch thick Alton cuts it into one inch pieces and rolls these into marble sized balls. He smashes each of these and uses a dowel to roll them into discs, turning several times. When the dough is nickel-thick he cuts it round with a biscuit cutter (the scrapes can be reused).

Alton’s filling starts with ricotta cheese. He adds parmesan cheese, frozen spinach (thawed and drained thoroughly), a little egg, some pepper and a pinch of grated nutmeg. Alton puts a quarter teaspoon of this mixture on the disc (emphasizing again the importance of thoroughly draining the spinach before making the filling). Then he puts egg wash on half the disc and folds it over to seal it. When it’s sealed he folds the long edge over his index finger to bring the two ends together. These cook the same way as ravioli – a couple of minutes in the boiling water until the float to the surface.

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