Adventures in Pasta

Pasta Maker

In the years before I began a plant based diet, I frequently made pasta. I used the hand cranked pasta maker in the picture to make regular, whole wheat, spinach and herb pastas. They included ravioli, spaghetti, linguine, and lasagna.  One thing they all had in common was the use of eggs. Today was my first attempt at making a vegan pasta.  I also used semolina flour for the first time. In place of the eggs, I used my go to mix of ground flaxseed, starch, oil, baking powder and water. This dough was exceptionally dry.  I used much more water than the recipe called for and still could not get the dough pliable enough to roll through the pasta maker.  I had to roll it out by hand and cut it into pieces. This left a pasta that was much thicker than the traditional Italian style pasta.

Pasta Pieces 

After boiling it, the pasta reminded me of spaetzel. It was good, just not the texture I was going for. I don't know it the difference was because of the fake egg or the semolina flour.  I will have to experiment with this further.  The sauce I made for the pasta used a garlic and olive blend that sauteed grated carrots, green onion and broccoli.  I added some red wine, honey, and dijon to the simmer sauce.  This was a good lunch.

For dinner I did my own take on Chicken and Waffles.  I made a waffle mix with semolina flour and yeast, that rose during the afternoon.  I do not have a waffle maker, so I spread the mixture in a square grill pan and roasted it until crispy.

Waffle

The waffle was not sweet and tasted like it had some cornmeal in it (it did not.)  I did a stir fry for the 'chicken' part. I cooked some red cabbage, yellow squash, and sugar snap peas in sesame oil.  I had a sauce with broth, sherry and rice starch. I added some seitan in place of the chicken. Everything looks a little purple because of the red cabbage.

'Chicken' and Waffles

At the end of the day I made some Whole Wheat Bread Sticks for tomorrow.  They used equal parts whole wheat flour and wheat germ with some nut milk, coconut oil and a little bit of yeast.  The sticks were rolled in sesame seeds before baking.

Bread sticks