Kitchen Curious: Making this kid-friendly pasta is like rolling Play-Doh
Countless parents are pulling out their hair as they deal with cooped-up kids during the coronavirus pandemic. What do you do with active bodies that can’t go to school, the playground or a friend’s house? Put ‘em to work in the kitchen!
This week’s recipe not only occupies antsy kiddos but also gets dinner on the table. And if your brood likes spaghetti and meatballs, they’ll approve of this dish.
Umbricelli is a hand-rolled noodle, a specialty of Umbria in central Italy. The noodles are thicker than spaghetti and are made with just water, flour and salt. This particular recipe is published in Ashley Rodriguez's "Let's Stay In" (Running Press, 2018), whose cookbook offers plenty of inspiration for quarantine cooking.
Once you make the pasta dough, grab the kids, have them thoroughly wash their grubby hands (a great COVID-19 teaching moment!) and then let them pinch off some dough and start rolling the noodles between their hands or on the counter. Rodriguez likens the method to “a toddler constructing Play-Doh snakes.”
When the kids start arguing about whose noodles are better, remind them that there’s no wrong noodle. “Don’t fuss with exactness: part of the fun when eating these noodles is all the variance in size,” Rodriguez writes.
She notes that making umbricelli is a labor of love; the project can take some time. She suggests encouraging anyone who wanders into the kitchen to lend a hand. The Sunday afternoon that I spent rolling soft dough into long snakes, no one wandered in. But I was content with a glass of wine nearby, oldies spinning on the record player, and colorful memories of my own kids’ Play-Doh days.
Umbricelli
- 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 2/3 cup warm water
- Pinch of sea salt
- Additional all-purpose flour or semolina, for pan
- Prepared pasta sauce, for serving
- Grated Parmesan cheese, for serving
- Place the flour, warm water, and sea salt in a large bowl. Stir until just combined, then plop out onto the counter or large cutting board to knead. You may consider this your workout for the day as you’ll be kneading for nearly 10 minutes to get a smooth elastic dough. Take a break every now and again for just a minute to relax the gluten (and your muscles), then proceed again until the dough feels like soft, unsullied skin. Wrap the dough tightly in plastic wrap, then set aside to rest for 30 minutes.
- Slip a piece of parchment onto a sheet pan, then shower a bit of flour or semolina onto the parchment. Keep that near your rolling station. Pinch off a small bit of the noodle dough, keeping the rest of the dough well wrapped throughout the process. Roll the noodles as if you were a toddler constructing Play-Doh snakes. They should be about 1/4-inch thick, but please don’t fuss with exactness: part of the fun when eating these noodles is all the variance in size. Set the finished noodles on the prepared sheet pan and toss to coat in a bit of the flour or semolina every now and again.
- Continue forming the noodles until all the dough has been used up. Encourage anyone who wanders into the kitchen to help roll a few noodles. I can think of no better recipe to get the kids involved in the process.
- After the noodles have been made, get a big pot of heavily salted water boiling.
- Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until just plumped and floating at the top of the water’s edge. Drain well.
- Toss to coat in warm pasta sauce. Serve immediately with Parmesan. Serves 4-6.
Nutritional information
Per serving: (based on 4) 228 calories (percent of calories from fat, 2), 6 grams protein, 48 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams fiber, 1 gram fat (trace saturated fat), no cholesterol, 32 milligrams sodium.Adapted from “Let’s Stay In” © 2018, by Ashley Rodriguez, Running Press.
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About the Author
Ligaya Figueras is the AJC's senior editor for Food & Dining. Prior to joining the AJC in 2015, she was the executive editor for St. Louis-based culinary magazine Sauce. She has worked in the publishing industry since 1999 and holds degrees from St. Louis University and the University of Michigan.
