Homemade Multi Colored Pasta

Homemade Striped Colored Pasta....My first attempt at making homemade pasta...handmade...no pasta machine! I have to admit that this recipe was inspired by a blog I visited recently. I was blown away with her creativity! You can visit her blog here. Her creations are amazing! Oh, I forgot to mention that her blog is in German!:) ...pictures are fabulous...and if you know a bit of German you will understand it more than I did!

I just loved that she used natural food colors and not any food dyes. I just used a basic pasta dough that I mixed the various colors into it to make the stripes. I just really used my own amounts with the coloring and I found out later after I boiled them that the colors faded a bit(though I think that is normal). Next time, I will knead in more of the colors. I found some colored powders at my local Natural Foods store. They didn't have too many choices...but, I was grateful for what I found. Enough to make my pasta creations!

I used beetroot powder,tomato powder,barley powder and the regular uncolored dough. You can easily substitute for the barley (broccoli,spinach,parsley,cilantro). The tomato powder can be substituted by carrot powder. You can also use turmeric to make a yellow dough. This is fun to be creative with....how about checkers instead of stripes, bi colored, tri colored or just making individual colors? Have fun with this recipe! Hope you enjoy...

Pasta dough ingredients:(or use your own favorite pasta dough recipe)

1 cup flour

1 cup semolina flour

2 eggs

2-3 TBS water

1 tsp salt

2 tsp oil

food powders (beetroot,tomato,spinach etc... amount depends on how bright you want the colors to be...start with 1 tsp.)

*you can just use eggs instead of adding oil and water...add 3 eggs instead of 2

Directions:

1. In a large bowl combine and whisk semolina flour, flour, and salt.
2. Make a well in the middle and add eggs.

3. Mix and incorporate the eggs with your hands.
4. Add oil and knead...adding 1 TBS of water to dough until all the flour is incorporated into the dough.

5.Split the dough into 5 parts.
6. Add a different color powder to 3 of the dough pieces leaving 2 dough pieces plain colored.

 7. Knead in the colored powder into the dough for approx. 8-9 minutes by hand or until smooth and elastic/pliable.
8. Roll each dough piece out to 1/4 inch or so(depending how wide you want the lines to be).

9. Place each dough piece on top of each other, alternating with a plain color to make stripes.

Make sure you seal the layers with a bit of water( you can use a damp/wet towel to wipe the layers).
10. Cut rough ends off and then cut into 1 inch strips.
11. Seal 2-3 strips together(use the damp towel).

12. Gently roll pasta dough to a 1/8 inch thickness. If you have a pasta machine, this step would be much easier!

13. Use pasta dough to make ravioli.... or make fettuccine.... or make bow ties.
14. Cook in salted boiling water till desired doneness.