Tonight I (Alex) wanted to make something delicious for Max because he has finals all this week and is studying all the time! So I decided to make pasta from scratch and top it with lamb ragu–a quick but tasty meat sauce.

The ingredients for pasta are simple: flour, eggs, salt, and a little water if the dough seems to dry.  Some recipes also suggest adding olive oil but I decided against that. You blend them all together in a mixer, form into a ball, and then let sit in the fridge for half an hour covered in plastic wrap. Then you split the ball into 4 pieces and roll out one to about 1/4 inch thick (put the other pieces back in the fridge to stay cold).

After you have rolled out the dough,  you use your pasta roller to gradually thin the dough out. I start out on the lowest setting: 1 and fold the dough over a couple times and keep putting it through 1 till it is elastic with no holes.  Then you decrease the thickness setting by setting.  I took the pasta sheet to setting no. 6, which is pretty thin.  Now it’s time to make the noodles.  I chose fettucine noodles so I switched the pasta attachment to that; cut my long, thin pasta sheet in half and ran it through the pasta cutter….very cool.  I put a bowl underneath to catch the noodles, and if you have corn meal, it’s good to dust them with it so they don’t stick together.  Also if you decide to roll out all the pasta pieces in sheets before you cut them into noodles, make sure you put them on a flour covered (or corn-meal covered) surface or pan. Otherwise they will stick together.

For the sauce, the ingredients are minced onion, a pound of ground lamb, a can of chopped tomatoes,  1/2  cup of milk or cream and salt and pepper.  First you mince the onions (of course). Then you sautee the onions till translucent and add the lamb and cook till its no longer pink.  At that point check to see how much oil is in the pan (lamb can be very fatty) if there seems like a lot, scoop out the excess.  Tonight I scooped out about 3 tablespoons. Then add the tomatoes and let simmer.  Right before serving, add the milk or cream and add salt and pepper to taste.  (Because the lamb has so much flavor, you don’t need to let the sauce cook as much as a normal ragu or bolognese). Plate with the fresh pasta and grated pecorino romano (parmesan is ok, but pecorino is a little better because it’s made from sheep’s milk….and you are eating lamb ragu).