Pici - A hand made pasta

Pici! Pici! Pici!

This is a very relaxing recipe....

and

Pici Pici Pici is My Mantra!! :D

Pici is a handmade pasta originally from Tuscany. It is called food of the poor. I will say that it is the food of a hard worker poor! The ingredients are minimum but a lot of rolling by hand in here! It is a hard labor food... but if you know me, you know why I think it is very relaxing! :)

Pici it is very similar to stringozzi from Umbria!!

Great recipe for a Saturday morning to keep you and your kids busy!!! ;)

Ingredients

• 2 cups semolina flour and more for dusting.
• 2 cups all purpose flour and more for dusting.
• Salt
• 1 to 1 1/4 cups tepid water
• Tablespoon of EVOO. I used Tuscany Nuovo Oil from L'arte dell' Olivo 2011 Harvest.

Preparation

1. Put both flours in a bowl, add olive oil, salt, and little water at a time, and mix with your hands until you form an elastic and homogeneous dough. Remember add the water little at a time to prevent the dough to be sticky. You may use more or less water depending of your kitchen humidity. Don't add all the water at the same time. Add more water if necessary.
2. Make a ball with the dough, oil the ball lightly with olive oil, and let it rest for about half an hour covered with a kitchen tablecloth at room temperature.
3. Dust the working surface with flour and using a rolling pin roll the dough until you create a disc of about one inch (2cm) thick. Spread some oil on top.
4. Using a knife cut strips of 1cm wide. Hold each end with your hands and start rolling the strips with your hands. Hold one end with one hand and roll with the other hand. Roll back and forth until you create a spiraled snake like a noodle. Each strands should be about 18 inches long and as narrow and even you can. Don't worry if some of the strands are shorter. Just try to make them have the same thickness. Dust a tray with semolina and place your picis there. To avoid them to stick together make sure to dust them with semolina. Cover the picis with a towel until ready to use. You could also freeze the picis for several months.

We ate our picis fresh righ after we made them today with fresh sliced galic, Olio Nuovo, and fresh chopped sage, oregano, and basil from my garden... So good and fresh!!!