Pasta school 15: Make your own garganelli

Pasta from Emilia-Romagna: Garganelli

The little-known Garganelli pasta shape comes from the Emilia-Romagna region. It is similar to penne rigate, but the strips are not lengthwise but crosswise. Garganelli can therefore be used for all recipes for which you would otherwise use penne or rigatone. We have listed typical recipe ideas for garganelli in the blog post about this pasta shape. Of course, there are no limits to your own culinary imagination. Whether you prepare the sugo yourself or order a ready-made one from our range is up to you.

If you want to make the garganelli yourself, you will need a gnocchi board, as we have already used to make gnocchi and gnocchetti sardi. You also need a wooden stick with a diameter of approx. 1 cm. This is available in a set with the board or you can simply use a wooden spoon or whisk.

Pasta dough for garganelli

As garganelli evolved from a failed attempt to make tortellini, they are made from the same dough as tortellini. This means that they are made with eggs. Normally, the dough is made with a mixture of type 00 flour and durum wheat flour in a ratio of 2:1 with one egg per 100 g of flour. This is exactly how we did it. We used “our” Caputo Semola di grano duro rimacinata (durum wheat semolina) and Farina tipo 00 per Pasta fresca from Tre Grazie. The dough is kneaded well for a long time until it is nice and smooth and elastic, then wrapped in cling film and left to rest in the fridge for at least 20 minutes.

Make your own garganelli

After the resting time, the pasta dough is rolled out in portions to a thickness of approx. 1 mm. You can do this in the traditional way with a rolling pin or use a pasta machine. Then use a knife or, even better, a pizza cutter to cut the dough into 4 – 5 cm wide strips. If you fold it up a little beforehand, it will be quicker and more even. These narrow strips are then cut into squares. Add the off-cuts back to the dough in the cling film so that it doesn’t dry out.
Then wrap the dough square diagonally around the round stick and roll it with the dough over the gnocchi board. The outer surface is scored in this way. The first garganello is ready. The finished garganelli are left to rest on a clean cloth or drying rack for a few hours before being cooked. You can also cook them straight away in boiling water.