Because I have SO much spare time!

We didn't get very far with our Mama & Megan cooking blog...so I have decided to take the blog in another direction.  My dream of attending cooking school has yet to become a reality, so I figure why not bring the cooking school to me?!

On my bachlorette party back in 2006, a group of my bff's all got together and participated in a Cooking Class at Tante Marie's cooking school in San Francisco.  It was the GREATEST night of my life.  Cooking with my friends, sipping wine and wrapping it up with a delicious dinner!  From that moment forward, graduating from Tante Marie's Cooking school was added to my bucket list.  I have been scheming & plotting HOW could I possibly round up $20k and take 8 months off to attend school full-time.  The lotto has yet to pay off. :)  So as those of you who know me would understand, I am not a person who takes kindly to being restricted by time or money....so I will create my own Tante Marie's Cooking School right here in my home!

Inspired by the movie Julie & Julia, I will be cooking my way through the "Tante Marie's Cooking School Cookbook" right here in my kitchen.  This book was a gift to me from my friends on the night of my bachlorette party and autographed by the founder of the school, Mary Risley.  We were so fortunate to have Mary leading us that night.  She made us feel welcome in her kitchen and we were truly blessed with her presence and passion.

Mary has received the Cooking Teacher of the Year award from Bon Appetit magazine as well as "Humanitarian of the Year" award from the James Beard foundation for her work in helping to alleviate hunger.  You can find more info on their website www.tantemarie.com.

And so it begins, with no time limit, I will begin the journey (hoping Megan & Lauren join me along the way) of cooking my way through cooking school at home.  I know Jim will enjoy this journey!

Starting this week with the Introduction: List of Equipment (woo hoo-shopping for cooking supplies!), the history of sauces and studying methods of cooking (including the correction of sauces, textures & taste).

Off I go . . .

Memories of the wonderful night :)

Carbs Schmarbs! ....let's make PASTA!

Mama: Hey Meg, You wanna learn how to make Parpadelle Pasta?

Megan: Parpa-what? What the heck is that?

Mama: Wide Noodles

Megan: No, I want to make American Girl Cupcakes

Mama: No, we are are going to make homemade pasta after school, so hurry home

Megan: : (Big Sigh)...Ok mom

Off we go . . .

Have you ever seen that recipe that throws you into an absolute craving for THAT specific food & you have to have it NOW? Well, looking through Vegetarian Times this month I crossed a Parpadelle Soup recipe. The soup looked ok, but that pasta caught my eye and I had to have that pasta NOW (well, okay...my next day off now!).

I found a recipe from Jamie Oliver for tagliatelle pasta with spinach, mascarpone and Parmesan, (link below)...the sauce looked amazing....but as you know...I was having mine with Parpadelle Pasta! So this is the sauce we used with our pasta....it was DELICIOUS! (http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetarian-recipes/tagliatelle-with-spinach-mascarpone-and)

As far as pasta making ...this how it rolled for us~

I found an awesome new YouTube "dude" that I subscribe too - he does cooking video's and I like his style. He has 3 great video's in his 257 video library on how to make pasta, roll out pasta and how to cut parpadelle pasta. After we gathered our ingredients & suited up...Megan, Lauren & I all watched each video before we started. http://www.youtube.com/user/dannynewnun?feature=watch

We decided to follow Danny's simple recipe:

About 1 cup of all-purpose flour, 3 egg yolks, pinch of salt & a drizzle of olive oil.

Easy Cheesey.

Side note: I had bought Semolina flour & we started by trying that, because I figured buy the most expensive flour & get the best results right? WRONG ...uh...I need more time with that stuff to figure it out. I would love suggestions from you home made pasta maker pros! ....Meg said it felt like sand & the dough got tough very fast. We tried mixing half all-purpose flour with half semolina...still tough. Then...we used the good ol' tried & true all purpose white flour, like the recipe said!!...ahhhh.....now that's pasta dough! Soft, gooey & stretchy :) Got a thumbs up from Megan.

Using the method from the video, we plopped our eggs in the middle of our flour "well" (we used 2 whole eggs in stead of just the 3 yolks as he recommends...cuz I didn't wanna waste those expensive Barnstar eggs!) and drizzled in about a tblspn. of olive oil along with a pinch of sea salt. Used a fork, whipped it up, gradually incorporated the eggs into flour until it was firm and then kneaded it as in came together.

Danny's video was truly a perfect tutorial for the first time pasta maker. ....after kneading for 5 minutes, drizzled a lil' oil on the dough, slipped it into a piece of a plastic & put into the fridge for 30 minutes. Just enough time to clean up Laurens dough mess!

Now...rolling out the pasta was a whole 'nother experience. Maybe it was my home hand cranking pasta machine...but there were definitely some tricks to this process.

Here is what we learned:

1. For the recipe this size - cut the dough ball in half before attempting to roll out in a manual roller! When we tried to roll out the entire ball - Megan had to turn the crank while I held down the machine...haha! The dough was a MESS ...At this point 99 cent pasta at Trader Joe's seemed like a better choice :)

2. Bringing the dough all the way down to the 1 setting makes the BEST parpadelle!! It was thin & silky.

3. Buy or borrow an electric pasta machine :)

After rolled out the sheets to a super soft & thin sheet...we used a pizza cutter to cut long strip of pasta & laid across a wood cutting board to dry while we rolled more.

I know the recipes say to fold the dough over & then trim into thick strips to make parpadelle...but that all seemed weird. I just just figured run over the dough with a pizza cutter & call it a day~

Into a pot of boiling salted water for a few minutes, then into the silky creamy cheese spinach sauce and finally into our bellies! Full, bloated & happy.

There is something so satisfying and yummy about a bowl of good ol' pasta :)