Homemade Almond Flour Pasta

A while back my aunt came upon an awesome deal for a pasta roller. She snagged it up (obv) and then asked me for a good Paleo pasta recipe. I told her to try a spiralizer. 😉

It kind of stuck in my head, though. Up to that point I had never seen a grain and legume free pasta pasta. Sure, there were noodles and spiralized veggie “noodles”, but no pasta (that I had seen). So I decided to make some. The scientist in me got all excited about figuring out how to replicate the structure of pasta without gluten.

If you haven’t noticed by now, I kind of have a thing for almond flour. I don’t know exactly why. Maybe it’s because I can bake treats and tell myself that I’m just eating healthy almonds, not dessert. 😉 I mean, really, I am eating almonds, right? Justified.

Anyway, this isn’t dessert. It’s pasta. Eggy, chewy with a bit of al dente bite pasta. And there are no grains or legumes involved. It’s just almond flour, tapioca flour, eggs and a bit of xanthan gum and salt.

I’m not going to call these Paleo since I do add xanthan gum, and I know it’s a polarizing ingredient. If you’re cool with the xanthan gum, then happy birthday! You can eat pasta!

I like to use the mound of flour + eggs in a well method for mixing up pasta. I find that method ensures the perfect amount of flour added to the eggs every time. Eggs aren’t all exactly the same size (get on that, hens! :P), so sometimes you might need more or less flour than other times. Making an egg volcano gets it right every time. Every time. How many times can I say that before it gets annoying?

Author: Joy @ The Joyful Foodie
Recipe type: pasta, gluten free, grain free
Serves: about 4 servings

Ingredients

2 cups almond flour
2 cups tapioca starch
2 Tbs + 2 tsp xanthan gum
3 eggs, large
1 tsp sea salt

Instructions

Place the almond flour, tapioca starch and xantham gum in a bowl and whisk to combine.
In a bowl or large work area, mound two cups of the flour mixture and create a well in the middle.
Add the salt and crack the eggs into the well.
Using a fork or your fingers gently beat the eggs, slowly incorporating flour into the eggs until all of it is combined or until the dough can be kneaded by hand.
Knead dough until it is smooth and elastic. The dough should be pliable but not too sticky. If dough is sticky, add flour a little at a time, kneading until smooth.
Roll the dough into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap and allow to rest for about 30 minutes.
Divide the dough into four equal pieces and use your hands to shape each piece into a rectangle about a quarter of an inch thick.
Send the first piece through the pasta roller at setting 1.
Fold the piece in half and send through again. Repeat one or two more times until the dough feeds through smoothly, dusting with tapioca starch to keep it from sticking.
Change to setting 2 and feed the dough through. Repeat until you get to your desired thinness (I like setting 3, some prefer setting 4). As you go, dust the pasta sheets with a bit of the flour mixture or tapioca starch to keep the sheets from sticking.
Repeat for each of the remaining three pieces of dough.
Switch to a pasta cutter and feed each piece through or slice each sheet into pasta strands with a knife.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil.
Drop in pasta strands and cook for 60 seconds while stirring.
Remove pasta from water and toss with olive oil.
Serve with sauce or toppings of choice.