Betty now makes pasta

Tragedy
While the pasta was great, nothing could save the bland, soggy lasagne

Betty now makes pasta

I've had my Betty for awhile now. She's great at making cakes, slices, even pizza. But I thought it was time Betty expanded her range of tricks a little, so being a pasta fanatic, I recently invested in a Kitchenaid pasta attachment for her.

Feeding pasta through the attachment

I've made pasta by hand before. It's actually pretty easy and there's something satisfying about eating pasta that you've made yourself. Before I bought the attachment, I used to borrow my mother-in-law's hand cranked pasta machine. Those pasta machines are fine, but there's a little bit more fiddling around - you need to clamp them to a table top, then hand crank the pasta through the machine while feeding it through with one hand, and then needing a third hand at the same time to catch it.

Having a pasta attachment on Betty though is so much easier. The pasta is fed through the rollers automatically using the stand mixer's motor. Without having to hand crank the machine, it allows me the free use of both hands to feed the pasta into the rollers and catch it on the other side at the same time. Good thing too, as rolling some of these pasta sheets out, they were getting pretty long - a couple of metres in length at least.

Loooong pasta sheets rolled out

The recipe for the pasta itself is pretty simple - flour (I used Tipo 00, found in my local Italian grocer), eggs, a splash of water and some salt. Allowing me to be virtually hands off, Betty mixed the ingredients together in a bowl to form dough, briefly kneaded it with the dough hook and I then left it to rest.

Next was the question of what to do with the pasta. The attachment set I bought included tagliatelle and spaghetti cutters, so I had planned to make tagliatelle with a basic chilli, garlic and tomato sauce. But the day before, I spotted some butternut pumpkin, and - it being scarcely ever available - picked some up, decided I could make a vegetarian lasagne with it, especially since Emperor D has been asking me to make one for awhile. I also picked up some sweet potato, another of Emperor D's favourites. So after some research with what I could make with the pumpkin and the sweet potato, I decided to make Lorraine Pascale's Butternut and Sweet Potato Lasagne.

I didn't follow the recipe exactly to plan - I didn't have any sage leaves and didn't use the breadcrumb topping, plus I'm not a fan of ricotta, so used my own much more simple béchamel sauce - but it shouldn't made so much of a difference to turn out to be so bland as it was.

Pumpkin and sweet potato lasagne

The other problem was the lasagne sheets. I'd made fresh lasagne once before, but swore never to do so again. They're of course easy to make, but when I made them the first time, I thought I had to pre boil them, and did so. They became extremely difficult to handle, becoming stuck together, and tore once cooked - it ended up being so hard that I decided I wouldn't do it again. That was a few years ago, and making lasagne this time around I quickly remembered why I said back then I would never do so again. I had the same issues again this time and it turned into a disaster. This time I swear I definitely won't make fresh lasagne again.

The end result was a lasagne that was soggy from too much water, and rather flavourless. I was lucky to eat half a piece. Utter tragedy.

On the upside, I had so much pasta that I was able to make tagliatelle and freeze it, so I'll find a sauce to go with it and make that soon. But with the attachment, I can't wait to make lots of fresh tagliatelle, spaghetti, ravioli - and blog about it.

Vying for my husband’s affection – with lasagne.

Transcendent
But then, my lasagne is always perfect. Though perhaps I’m biased.

Vying for my husband’s affection – with lasagne.

Starting the layers; sheet,
meat, sauce

Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve always loved my mum’s lasagne. Growing up, we had a family tradition where someone would get to choose what the family meal was on their birthday; I remember most years choosing lasagne. As a kid, I never really knew why I loved it so much – I mean, it tastes great; it’s made by my mum – however, there was always something else about it that just made it what it is, but I could never quite put my finger on it. As an adult, I worked it out; it’s texture. There are the soft, thin layers of lasagne sheets; the saucy, chunky, meatiness of the filling; perhaps my favourite part, the creamy gooeyness of the white béchamel sauce; and the slight crispiness of the cheese melted on top.

Once I moved out of home, I got mum to show me how to make it and these days, it’s one of those few recipes that I don’t have an actual recipe written down for; I just grab the ingredients I need, and I just *know* how much of each thing I need to make it perfect.  Some onion, garlic, mince, tinned tomatoes, tomato paste, red wine, oregano, mixed Italian herbs and some bay leaves make up the sauce. Just simple butter, cornflower and milk gives me a great white or béchamel sauce. And lasagne sheets. I use commercial lasagne sheets these days as they’re perfectly fine, but if you want to go the whole hog, make them fresh yourself. I’ve done it once, but it was such a hassle, I’m not sure I’d do it again.

Bubbling and golden out of the oven

My mother-in-law, on the other hand, makes fresh lasagne sheets almost every time. I don’t know how she does it. I mean, I know the method of making them, but for the quantities of lasagne she makes, that’s a lot of lasagne sheets. And I have to feel for poor Emperor D. Being of Italian descent, his mum makes the most amazing pastas. Her pasta sauce is just divine – my sister-in-law has tried many times to replicate it, but apparently has not quite tasted the same. But her lasagne is very different from mine.

I always tease Emperor D about whose lasagne he thinks is better – his wife’s or his mum’s. I shouldn’t be so mean, but I never tire of hearing him emphatically exclaiming that mine is very good, while at the same time diplomatically stating that ‘they’re each very different’, as if comparing apples with oranges. And they are quite different. Emperor D’s mum comes from Sicily, in southern Italy, where it seems they do things a little different to other parts of Italy. But then, most regions of Italy do the same dish with slight variations. I’ve asked her about a particular dish – minestrone for example – that I’ve seen in a cookbook, and she’ll look at the recipe and say, ‘that’s not minestrone – not how we do it. That minestrone is from northern Italy’. I’m amazed that she can tell there’s a difference, let alone what part of Italy it’s from.

Buon appetito!

Emperor D’s mum makes lasagne with only a meat sauce, very thinly layered between thick homemade sheets of fresh pasta. There’s no béchamel or even cheese on top. It’s nice, but for me, I like the structure, the textures and the taste of my own better. And to say that I prefer something of my own cooking over something of Emperor D’s mum is saying a lot – she is an amazing cook and I have no hesitation in saying that I prefer her versions of other dishes I do. But when it comes to lasagne, which my mum has made with love since I was a little girl, I find that the original – the version I’ve grown up with – is still the best.