Full question
When following your recipes for pasta dishes, I never know whether the weight you are using is referring to dried or fresh pasta. Please can you clarify? Thank you.
Our answer
Nigella has many pasta dishes, such as Lasagne Of Love, Hearty Wholewheat Pasta With Brussels Sprouts, Cheese And Potato and Vegan Spag Bol and unless the pasta is specified as fresh pasta, you should use dried pasta and the weight given is for dried pasta. We would suggest using as good quality pasta as possible and cooking the pasta in generously salted water. Also, start checking the pasta for doneness a couple of minutes before the full cooking time suggested on the packaging, so that it doesn't overcook.
If you prefer to use fresh pasta then usually you would use approximately 1.25-1.5 x the weight of dried pasta if the fresh pasta is store-bought. If it is home made and rich in eggs then you may prefer to use less and you can also adjust the amounts according to appetite. Cooking times need to be adjusted as fresh pasta cooks very quickly, usually in less than 5 minutes. If you would like to try making your own pasta then Nigella has a recipe for Fresh Tagliatelle.
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