Saturday Baking on The Homestead

We finished breakfast rather leisurely this morning. Dewey and Matthew are out working on the coop run -- now that wehave a few laying, I want to ensure their safety from the owls, so we are *finally* closing off the top with some fencing.

The olders and I just made a small batch of noodles. Should have gone ahead and made a large batch as time is about the same, but my head is in such a fog I just didn't feel like fussing with it. We'll do a large batch later, when the humidity is a bit less and they can dry completely.

The photo is the fruits of the half-hour labor. They don't need to dry really, as I'm putting them in the chicken soup I started simmering yesterday, but we'll let them dry this morning anyway before adding them into the pot.

Here's our recipe:
3 cups flour
3 eggs (I just use the whole egg, some prefer only the yolk)
3 Tbs water
A pinch of salt

Our big batch noodles is:
30 cups flour
30 eggs
30 Tbs water. (About 1/2 cup plus 2 or 3 Tbs)

These will dry fully, depending on weather conditions, in about a week, then you can pack them away in an air tight container or portion off into freezer bags. We usually pack ours into a 5 gallon bucket. They will keep *if totally dry* for about 6 months...we never manage to keep them that long :o)

We rolled ours using my Atlas hand-crank roller, but you can easily roll them by hand on a floured board (flour your rolling pin or dough surface as well) then cut using a sharp pointed knife.

Homemade noodles will cook up about twice their thickness, so unless you are wanting a flat dumpling, roll out as thin as you can before cutting (1/16 inch).

The hand-roller can be set to any setting to get your chosen thickness. We rolled these through 4 times, to a 5 on my dial, then kept with the lazy mode and ran them through the cutter side. I can do this width and a spaghetti width. Other widths have to be cut by hand using the cutter wheel, which adjusts also.

Right now with noodles drying on the rack, we're starting a 6-loaf batch of bread. Good hot chicken soup with lots of garlic in it, homemade noodles cooked in the stock and fresh warm bread...YUM on the Homestead :o)