Yesterday, and the day before I must add, I made pasta. From scratch. Just eggs, flour, some water, and a little salt. I made three batches: one first with random sized strands which I hung along the bottom-side of a folding wooden tray stand; secondly as tortellini, stuffed with remnants from Thanksgiving sweet potato; and lastly, as three-hour fresh noodles, long and stiff. I cooked the second batch first, during lunch. They were eggy and chewy and very, very sweet. The first and third batches I cooked for dinner, complemented with a handmade tomato sauce my sister whipped up during her time working on an organic demonstration farm, with added seasonings from me. We rounded the meal out with some garlic bread and a salad which claims about 50% of it's origins to the sandy, clayish soil outside our house.
It was a good dinner.
Pasta homemade seems like such chore; my mom was commenting on how much work I was putting into rolling the dough translucently thin, when I could easily purchase a decent box of spaghetti at the store for less than a dollar. (in some markets).
But to actually know where something comes from, and how to make it, that's what I really want to know. I think that if more people realized exactly where all of their food comes from, and especially, what they are made from, more people would take the time to make things themselves, or at least contract a chef, etc to do it if they don't have the time, etc.
However, I also know that the idea of hiring a chef to cook healthy meals is something that only certain individuals can even take a gander at. It's a hard line to follow: wanting the best, yet, making sure others have the best, too.
