Week 12: Cooking Pasta | Cooking Eggs

Day 1 this week was our Pasta Palooza Prep Day! We began with picking our Sweet Endings event, which is (drum roll, please).... PIE! The only recipe we were given is below:

The pie dough recipe is relatively basic. We are considering doing a fruit pie, OR a heavy chocolate pie! With this recipe, we have lots of options which is good.

The rest of the day was primarily prepping for our pasta event. We had one "aha" moment, when we forgot to put an egg in the mushroom mixture, making it crumbly and hard to stay together. It turns out, every ingredient has a purpose! Who knew.

 Chef also wanted us to know the importance of covering dough to ensure that it does not dry out.

Here, the boys were stuffing the mushrooms WITHOUT egg. They had a hard time because it was such a bad consistency! Once we added egg, they were much easier to work with.

 ALSO on this first day, we learned how to roll the dough to the right thickness and cut it for each type of pasta. Mikki took over ours, and we made little individual strips so that the lasagna would be easy to roll up and already cut and ready to serve.

Above is Chef's demonstration on how to properly roll the dough. When you crank it through the machine, you have to be careful to not rip it, but also be aware that it will get longer as you increase the thickness number. When cutting, it is typical to make the noodle around a foot or less long in strips.

LASTLY, Chef showed us some fun things to do with the noodles we made!

To the left is an example that Chef showed us. We put a flattened basil leaf in the middle of two squares, then carefully put it through the machine. This would be a great way to make lasagna, so the top was pretty and had a great flavor when cooked!







 




Day 2 was our PASTA PALOOZA EVENT! I am happy to say that it went incredibly well, from preparation to cooking to tasting to the decorations.

Our group, or "mob". We got a great response from our guests with our theme and costumes. They loved the creativity and historical representation with Naples and the mafia!

We had to add some questionable items to the decor. As we explained to our guests, "a man earlier had a mushroom allergy". Everyone seemed to enjoy the aesthetic!

Once our lasagna was rolled and cooked, we wanted to make sure that it stayed warm. Our "aha" moment was putting a pan with boiling water on the stove, then taking two small bowls on the water and placing our lasagna pan over the top! The lasagna stayed hot until the end which was great, and a huge improvement from our last events.

Here is our covered and not-covered lasagna! We had one guest tell us that it was his favorite dish of the day. Guests were pleased that it stayed warm, thanks to our cooking method and stove-top setup. The extra cheese on top of the lasagna added a nice aesthetically pleasing touch.

 To the left is our final lasagna and mushroom on a plate, as well as our sign! The decorations went well with the food, and even the class "Italy" theme. Not only did people like the costumes, but we managed to stay in character as well.




In week 11, we learned the importance of measuring out all ingredients and laying them out BEFORE starting a mixture. We did this same thing with the filling for the lasagna and it ended up being a great idea. This way, once the cheeses were mixed, we were able to eye-ball if there were too many onions, mushrooms, or other ingredients.