Homemade Pasta alla Norma – A Taste of Sicily

 

After traveling abroad to Sicily to study the Mediterranean diet, I became obsessed with homemade pasta. I was never much of a pasta eater before the trip, mostly because I hated how overstuffed it made me feel, but once I tasted true homemade pasta from the kitchens in Sicily my view of pasta drastically changed. I could eat bowls of pasta every single day, and actually feel good after eating the meal, as opposed to feeling like I needed to be rolled out of the restaurant like I usually do in the US. I realized the main difference in this feeling of fullness versus satisfaction was in the method of making the pasta [and the portion sizes]. Since I’ve been back home, I’ve done my best to recreate the signature pasta alla norma dish that I discovered that summer in Sicily.

After doing some digging, I found that Leanne Brown’s Good and Cheap recipe book served as a great guide to making an easy, affordable homemade pasta dish. I’ve combined and adapted the following recipe from two recipes in her cookbook. Although it’s impossible to truly recreate the experience of eating homemade pasta in Sicily, I hope that through making this dish you can get a little glimpse of that experience; both in the taste and good feeling following the meal! So, without furthur ado, I present to you the pasta alla norma!

 

Adapted from: Leanne Brown’s Good and Cheap

 

Making pasta from scratch may seem a bit intimidating, but it’s actually pretty easy. I’ve split the recipe up into 3 parts: 1. Making the Pasta, 2. Making the Rest, and 3. Final Touches. While making the dish myself, I found this to be the best order of steps to make the pasta in terms of the prep and time to cook things. Hopefully this works best for you too!

(Takes about 1-2 hours)

 

Part 1 – Making the Pasta:

 

• Ingredients (serves 2 – multiply ingredients for amount of people you’re serving)
  • 5 cup all purpose or bread flour
  • 2 eggs
  • Olive oil
• Supplies
  • 2 mixing bowls
  • Rolling pin
  • Pot
  • Strainer [for pasta after cooked]
  • Any large cutting knife
  • Plastic wrap

 

             

 

Pasta Method:

1. Wash your hands! (Although this step may seem self-explanatory, some people do forget – yuck.)
2. Pour the flour into the mixing bowl.
3. Create some room in the middle of the flour [in the bowl] and crack the egg.
4. Using your [clean] hands, mix the egg and flour together until they are properly blended. The flour tends to seem dry at first, so don’t panic if you think that’s the case. Add a teaspoon of water if the excess flour isn’t sticking to the rest or if you think it’s too dry.
5. Place a tablespoon or two of olive oil into another bowl. Transfer the dough from this bowl to the oiled bowl, and cover with plastic wrap.
6. Let the flour sit for anywhere between 1-2 hours. This will let some of the moisture from the egg [and water if you added it] release in the flour to make for a good dough ball!
7. Once an hour or so has passed, the dough should contain more moisture and you should be able to knead it to make a dough ball.
8. If you’re making the pasta for more than one person, separate the dough ball into smaller balls [1 dough ball per person you’re serving].
9. Flour your counter top or cutting board in preparation for rolling out the dough ball.
10. Once you’ve covered your surface of choice with flour it’s time to roll out the dough! [Be prepared this part will give you somewhat of an arm workout.]
11. [Caution: this part will give you somewhat of an arm workout!] Roll out the dough on the floured surface with a rolling pin. You want the dough to be as pretty thin – almost translucent to where you can almost see through the dough to the counter top. Also, I like to roll the dough into a square as much as possible to make the noodles more even when I cut them.
12. Once you’ve reached a fairly thin square of dough, it’s time to make the noodles! My favorite way to do this is to roll the dough up and then slice the noodles down the long part of the roll of dough. [See picture for finished cutting product.]
13. If you’re making multiple servings, be sure to place more flour on the surface before repeating steps 11-12 so the dough doesn’t stick to itself when cutting the noodles!
14. Now that the noodles are cut and ready to place into a pot, set them aside and have a pot filled about ½ – ¾ of the way to the top with water. Heavily salt the water to give the pasta the best flavor. And hold off on cooking the pasta until the rest of the ingredients have been cooked. [Fresh pasta noodles take only 30 seconds – 2 minutes to make so we’ll return to cooking the pasta later.]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Part 2 – Making the Rest:

 

• Now that the pasta noodles are pretty much ready to go, it’s time to make the eggplant and other good stuff! Here’s a list of the ingredients and materials necessary for this portion of the dish:
• Ingredients [serves 2]
  • 1 large eggplant
  • ¼ cup parmesan
  • ½ tsp red chili flakes
  • 4 cloves garlic [minced or finely chopped]
  • 2 cups canned tomatoes, finely diced
  • Basil
  • Olive oil
  • Salt & pepper
• Supplies
  • Large pan [either saucepan or skillet]
  • Spatula / Large mixing spoon of some sort
  • Large cutting knife

 

 

                   

 

Tomato & Eggplant Method:

1. Cut the eggplant. I found that the best way to do this is to cut both the ends off the eggplant, and then cut pieces about 1in wide down the long part of the eggplant.
2. After completing this step, you should have a good amount of circular eggplant slices (I had about 10-12 pieces). Next you should pile 3-4 eggplant disks on top of each other and cut into quarters. Do this until each eggplant disk is quartered.
3. Once you have all of the eggplant quarters, continue to cut them until you have eggplant cubes [small enough to eat with one bite of pasta]. Now that the hard part is over, now it’s time to cook!
4. Place olive oil in the saucepan or skillet and set the heat to medium-high.
5. Once the pan is hot and the oil is dispersed across the pan [about 30 seconds], place the eggplant slices into the pan and sprinkle the cubes with salt. Let the eggplant slices cook in the pan for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. (If the eggplant begins to look dry, add a touch of water.)
6. After 5 minutes, the eggplant cubes should start to look a little brown on the outside. Add the garlic and chili flakes to the pan and stir around until evenly dispersed.
7. Now it’s time to add the tomatoes! Add the tomatoes to the pan and let them cook for 15 minutes. Stir occasionally.
8. Set aside your Parmesan and basil so they’re ready to add later.
   1. For basil, I like to chop the leaves into smaller pieces, but you can always just tear the leaves apart. It’s whatever size you want them to be!

 

Part 3 – Final Touches:

 

            

 

 

1. Now that the eggplant and tomatoes are cooking, it’s time to return to the pasta!
2. Bring the pot with salted water to a boil. [Cover pot in order to make water boil faster.]
3. While the water is coming to a boil, return to your pasta noodle rolls. Unroll the pasta dough and make sure that the dough isn’t sticky. [If the dough seems a little sticky on the inside part of the roll, grab a handful of flour and lightly flour the noodle until it’s no longer sticky.] Place the uncooked, unrolled noodles in the original bowl you used to mix the dough.
4. After you’ve unrolled all the noodles and placed them in a bowl, you’re ready to add them to the pot to cook the pasta whenever the water reaches boiling! Leave the top off of the pot while the pasta is cooking so you can keep an eye on the noodles.
5. Return to your eggplant & tomato pan to stir again. Add half of the Parmesan cheese and basil. Continue to stir. [I like to add a sprinkle or two of salt and pepper to both cooking dishes at this point for flavor, but this step is up to you!]                  
6. Once the pasta has been cooking for max 2 minutes, check on the noodles to see if they’re done. To do this, I usually grab a fork and take a noodle out to see if it tastes good. If you think it’s good to go, drain the pasta in the sink with a pasta strainer. Let cool for a minute or two.
7. Turn the heat off of the eggplant and tomato pan. Pour the pasta in the second bowl you used to let the dough sit. Pour the tomato and eggplant ingredients on top.
8. Mix the ingredients all together. Add some olive oil, salt, pepper, and the rest of the parmesan and basil, and viola! The dish should be ready to serve and eat.
9. Enjoy yourself a little taste of Sicily! [I recommend to enjoy with a glass of wine if you’re 21 and up :)]