Rest Day and “Pici” Pasta Making Lesson with Isabella

By Thursday we were wiped out and really needed a rest day. We cancelled all activities for the day except for the Pasta Making lesson and Tuscan dinner that occurred on the property and wouldn’t start until 5:30pm.

Our laundered clothes drying under the Tuscan sun. They smelled wonderful and were super soft when I came to collect them later.

It was a great day to just stick around and enjoy the farm, rest, read, blog, and do laundry. They had great facilities there to wash your clothes and let them air dry in the Tuscan sun.

When I came out to hang my laundry I found these articles hanging on the line. I got scared by the jumbo underwear on the left. It was a reminder that if I don’t slow down on the carb consumption soon, this could be my laundry.

I think when you are traveling this long, it is important to just have a grounding day where you can rest and do grounding things…even laundry. Make breakfast and just sit and be. So we skipped the 9am Art & Artisan Tour, the 1pm-3pm cheese tasting at a neighboring farm that makes 30 types of cheeses. I mean, how much cheese can you eat in three weeks without skyrocketing your cholesterol. Yes, this was a health choice on several levels.

How Isabella looked when she greeted the class. This was her pre-lesson on cooking pasta and one of her ‘please I beg you’ moments that made us laugh so much.

We arrived at the “Pici” pasta making class on site, right on time to find Isabella there in a cool halter apron and white linen dress. She is the perfect match for Carlo – they are equally talented and Tuscan and you think ‘What? You know how to do that too?’

Step 1: She starts with a large mound of flour. This is Pasta for 30-35 people, so it wouldn’t be this crazy back home.

She walked us through how to make the dough from scratch. That process alone was a highlight of the trip. To hear her speak in her accent, mold the dough, and give us tips on making our own pasta at home.

You then make a dam with the flour and add water and eggs.

Five important things we learned about pasta cooking alone, that made me realize my whole life I have been a pasta cooking train-wreck:

NEVER add your salt to the water until after it has started boiling, otherwise it will take too long to boil.
Be generous with the salt in the water, it really adds flavor to the pasta itself while it is cooking. A pinch isn’t enough. She adds a handful (my heart stopped and I wondered just how big her pasta pot is at home for a handful, she must be cooking for more than just one).
NEVER add oil to your water. She said, ‘Please, I beg you.’ She said if you make your pasta oily before adding the sauce, ‘your Ragu will slide right off the pasta.’
NEVER pull your pasta out of the boiling water to strain and add cold water to stop it from cooking. She said again, ‘Please I beg you. Why you gonna do that?’ She said you need to pull your pasta out 2 minutes before it’s done and then add your sauce immediately. It will cook in the sauce another two minutes.
She makes all of her dough on one board using flour dams to contain the liquid. At the end, all she has to wash is one board, but conceded, it may be ‘too dangerous’ for us to try at home so if we want to cheat and use a Kitchen Aid – she said, ‘It’s okay, shhh, I won’t say anything.’

Isabella was a MARVEL to watch make the dough for us before she gave us lessons on how to roll the ‘Pici’ pasta, which is basically a very thick and delicious spaghetti noodle. It was invented during war time when all that they had to make pasta with was flour and water. Family traditions add eggs now – depending on your family, it will dictate the number of eggs you use.

She then beats the eggs and water together before she starts to fold the flour into the dough in a cool rhythmic process that looked easy for her but for me would result in water all over my floor, hence the ‘dangerous’ word she kept using.

She approached her dough making with such gusto, flour on her face and arms and such enthusiasm for what she was doing. I only wish I could have video’d her whole lesson as it made me laugh so much to hear her ‘begging’ us not to do things and explaining the way to make the pasta.

Great action shot of Isabella kneading the big dough mound once all of the liquid was absorbed.

Soon enough we all had our own little pile of dough that she gave us to knead ourselves until it was ready. She would come by and tell us when it was ready by pushing her finger in the dough and feeling the resistance and moisture level. She was like a Doctor of pasta coming around to check on us.

Dana and I in process of kneading our dough. Push and roll, push and roll (wth heal of hand only).

After that step, we began the rolling process, which, once you got going with it – you could get the hang of it. I think I could even host a ‘Pici Pasta’ making party when I get home and channel my inner Isabella. Who’s in?

Our dough once it was ready to start rolling into pasta.

Once we were done making all of the fresh pasta, they would take it away to another part of the farm to start boiling it and they also began the preparations for our outdoor Tuscan dinner at one long table. We’d eat the pasta, some side dishes, and Carlo would be grilling sausage and pork ribs (of course he knows how to grill meats as well, is there anything he can’t do?).

Cutting out a strip off of the dough to begin rolling.

We rested a bit for dinner and opened the wine that was our replacement wine from the lake region to have with dinner (remember the brown wine we purchased and returned in Stresa?). The replacement wine was coincidentally a Brunello – which is the most famous wine of this region. It was going to be perfect with our Tuscan Dinner!