Many have heard the zen proverb that says “if you don’t have time to meditate for an hour, you should meditate for two.”
I would argue that you could view homemade pasta in the same way.
You can buy great pasta. It’s everywhere. Italian cuisine is verified as one of the world’s favourites. Pasta lines our menus, our worldly supermarket and deli shelves, and the slow-motion food documentaries of Netflix. It can be cheap or expensive, vegetarian or meaty, dried or fresh, long, small, or ugly, and it’s delicious. It’s the one food that almost everyone loves, even catering to the unbelievably fussy and overly elitist.
The point is, pasta is hardly a needle and the haystack is everywhere you look.
So why make pasta yourself? I certainly didn’t until recently. Seemingly produced via culinary alchemy, fresh pasta is silky smooth, translucent and takes precious seconds to cook. It doesn’t resemble the ingredients that make it and it is the perfect vehicle for sauces spanning the savoury spectrum. But the process of making it and the variety of techniques can be intimidating.
Besides—you tell yourself—surely, someone else will do a better job.
Yes, that’s undoubtedly true. You are likely not steeped in Italian gastro-heritage or in possession of the most succulent organic San Marzano tomatoes or local ‘00’ flour. But that’s not the point. There is nothing spontaneous about mastery. What’s the worst that can happen?
Anyone that’s seen the show Master of None can relate to the neophyte’s first process. You gather the ingredients just like Dev—the flour, the eggs, the apron. You collect the patience and attention, spanning a few short hours. It’s slow going, and it’s great.
The message here is that if you don’t have time to make pasta, make time to make pasta. You won’t regret it. It’s the details that make life whole.