As any traditional British family would agree one of our biggest staples is pasta. I was terrified at the thought that we would be living without this for the year as on both supermarket trips I have only found pasta made in Italy.
I am however not afraid of a bit of ‘do it yourself’ and have been a proud possessor of a pasta machine since my 18th birthday (a bit of a right of passage). So with this in mind, on my last trip to Waitrose I found some lovely white spelt flour from Sharpham Park. Spelt is supposed to be easier to digest than wheat and have all sorts of other health benefits, but to be honest it was the only flour I could find that I thought might make a reasonable pasta flour substitute.
I present my first recipe of the year and with it a word of caution; If you roll this too thin it will turn into glue when you try to cook it! (This was the conclusion of spelt flour experiment number 1)
Spelt Flour Pasta Dough
500g Spelt Flour
275ml warm water
a good pinch of salt (British of course)
2-3 tbsp rapeseed oil
Mix all of the ingredients together and knead gently until dough is slightly springy. Wrap in clingfilm and rest for at least an hour at room temperature.
Roll out or shape on a pasta machine (3 or 4 on our machine was thin enough). Make sure that you work and roll out the pasta enough as this is what makes the pasta really silky and smooth to eat.
Enjoy with whatever sauce you like!
Ours contained leeks, home preserved sun dried tomatoes (from our garden 2 years ago), fresh basil, Isle of Wight garlic, Rapeseed oil, and Welsh hard goats cheese.
The pasta had a great taste and next time will have an improved texture. I would completely recommend you give it a go. We would love to see your results 🙂
– Emily
You never cease to amaze me not sure i have the patience for this recipe but look forward to your next post…I have not bought anything since before Christmas except milk (British of course) I plan to keep this up until I go to Australia on the 5th February. When I return I plan to have a go at buying British. Thanks for being such an encouragement
Oh can say with confidence Emily, mine would NOT look that good
Check out flours from http://www.wessexmill.co.uk they have a large range of flours (including pasta & pizza flour) from locally grown wheat.
Looks delicious! 🙂
Wow! I was just tweeting you and told you about Sharpham Park lol and you’ve already been there! They actually sell pasta there too if you don’t want to DIY… I doubt if I tried to make pasta it would come out that good!
I run a company in London called Seriously Italian and we are the first and only ones to actually produce pasta that is 100% British and organic. We make our pasta with durum wheat and spelt organically grown and stoneground in Northumberland and fresh organic eggs from East Sussex. If you live in London come and try our products, we sell directly at many Farmer’s markets and non in town. Take care, Giovanni