Fresh Spinach Pasta

Jaye Fong
by Jaye Fong
2 9x13 pan
2 hr 10 min

Homemade pasta is such a delight! This fresh spinach pasta is a showstopper and will be sure to impress your guests. You can use it for many applications, but I used it for an incredibly vibrant lasagna with ragu and bechamel sauce.


BEWARE! This recipe makes a HEROIC amount of spinach pasta. It can easily make 2 9x13 pans with at least 7 layers each. So I would recommend halving the recipe or even quartering it if you're considering using the recipe to make linguine or a single lasagna.


You can also make the full amount and freeze the dried pasta in bundles! See notes below recipe for details.


The best part of this recipe is that you can use fresh, washed, dry, spinach instead of spending time boiling it and squeezing the water out.


Spinach flour.

A lot of eggs!


The finish dough ready to rest.


Portioned out and put through all 6 settings of the pasta crank.

Ready to boil

Recipe details
  • 2  9x13 pan
  • Prep time: 2 Hours Cook time: 10 Minutes Total time: 2 hr 10 min
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Ingredients

  • 100g (~3 cups or 11oz) fresh spinach, mostly leaves (some stems ok)
  • 1kg (~4 cups or 35oz or 1000g) 00 or all-purpose flour
  • 10 lg eggs
Instructions

Remove any thick and fibrous stems from the spinach. You want mostly leaves, but a few stems/stalks are ok.
Wash and dry the pruned spinach.
Combine the flour and spinach into a food processor. Process until a fine powdery flour is achieved and no spinach bits are visible.
On a flat surface or in a stand mixer, pour out the spinach flour and create a well.
To the well add 10 eggs.
Using your hands (you can beat the eggs with a fork in the well if you like) or dough hook (slow-medium speed), slowly incorporate the eggs, pulling flour in a little at a time until the dough comes together.
Knead for at least 15-20 minutes by hand or 10 minutes by mixer until the dough comes to form a smooth ball.
Rest the dough for at least 30 minutes before using. An hour is preferred. This relaxes the gluten and makes it easier to roll/crank.
Cut your dough ball into eighths. Cover the dough with plastic film or a wet towel while you work to prevent a crust from forming. Set your pasta crank on the widest setting (1).
Using a rolling pin, roll the 1/8 piece of dough flat enough to feed through the crank. Crank through each setting at least twice. Move through all settings until you achieve the desired thickness. I worked all the way through to the thinnest setting for lasagna and linguine style noodles.
Boil the pasta in salted water about 2 minutes.
Tips
  • TOO DRY - Pasta dough can dry out very easily which means it'll form a crust. Make sure your dough stays nice and pliable by draping a wet cloth or plastic film over the unused dough while you work.
  • FREEZING - You can freeze uncooked fresh pasta. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper. Lay full sheets or create small bundles of pasta on the sheet. Freeze all the way through on the sheet pan. Remove from the freezer and bag as desired. You can also wrap it in plastic film or double bag to reduce freezer burn. Lasts 3-6 months.
  • SPINACH - This method uses fresh raw spinach and removes the blanching step. You can buy pre-washed spinach in the store which will also save you even more time! Just make sure the spinach is dried well before adding it to the flour. You don't want to have too much excess moisture.
  • TOO STICKY - If your dough is too sticky, carefully add 1 tbsp of flour at a time to the mixture. You don't want to incorporate too much flour as it will change the texture of the pasta. However, if it is too sticky to work with, you should definitely make sure your surface and your hands are dusted well with flour.
  • For reference, check out this Pasta Grannies vid! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UTrEpVKhKM
Jaye Fong
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Comments
  • Kevin N Myers Kevin N Myers on Jan 29, 2021

    Can you use almond flour and still get results. We are trying Keto food and wheat flour is a no go.

    • Jaye Fong Jaye Fong on Jan 29, 2021

      Hi, Kevin! Thanks for the question. I personally have not tried replacing the all-purpose flour with almond flour, but there are plenty of recipes that do, so I think it is possible! I would suggest making sure the almond flour is ground as fine as possible, so even if it is store-bought, put it through a food processor. The almond flour will also be too brittle on its own to form an elastic pasta since AP/00 ensure gluten is formed during the kneading. So, you'll likely have to incorporate a binding flour such as tapioca starch or rice flour. These you can find in the specialty/international aisle of a big grocery store, or an Asian grocery store! If you are working with the full-size of my recipe I would try replacing the 4 cps AP with 3 cups almond + 1 cup tapioca/rice to start! If it's too sticky, add more almond. If it's too dry, add a little bit more of the tapioca/rice flour. I hope this helps!

  • Susan Chartock Susan Chartock on Jan 27, 2024

    Great idea to make spinach lasagna noodles. Eager to try to make them since they look absolutely delicious and certainly would be a fine addition to traditional lasagna. Thank you.

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