Say hello to my little pastamaker

Yesterday I was fitted with this little gem of a machine. The city's foremost pastamachine specialist, Emilio, sat with me over a small batch of fritto misto and lemony aioli and plied me with something like twenty questions of what I was looking for and in the end he declared he had exactly the machine for me. He disapeared for an hour to retrieve it, and in the meantime I made a batch of pasta dough. There was a slight panic when I realized that the restaurant doesn't actually have the right mixer attachement for making pasta, a flat-beater it's called. We just have a dough hook at the moment which is exactly what you need to do pizza dough but exactly what you don't need to make pasta dough. So I had to improvise. The moment the eggs hit the semolina though a memory awakened in me, there is a subtle damp aroma that pasta dough yeilds and I had nearly forgotten it. And when I got my hands into it I knew I was going to be alright.

Every now and then I am reminded that all art, all art that I can think of, is just hand movements. If you assemble every artist you can think of; painters, musicians, sculptors, writers, cooks, and take away their tools and their objects you'd see that we're all doing a series of very intricate hand movements, some things, like drumming and fencing use other body parts as well, but if you really think of it in these terms we are all tai chi masters. And over the years, through the generosity of at least two very kind mentors, my hands learned exactly what to do, how to feel, what crumbly texture to aim for, which balance of wetness and dryness. By the time Emilio returned with my new Imperia machine he started to rolll out my dough and he exclaimed like three times what an excellent dough it was. The two things about Emilio are that he does this for a living so he knows a good one from a mediocre one, and he also is a no-nonsense kind of guy who doesn't fling around compliments just to make you feel good.

I had to make the dough slightly differently than the old days because where I used to work there was a monster of a machine, it had humungous rollers and it did all the work for you, little Imperias like mine in the picture need a slightly moister dough and require more folding and rolling, but the end result was very delicious.

I took a pretty girl out to a little place called Flour + Water last night. I have not been completely seduced by their pizza, maybe I'm biased but I think ours are so much better, a month ago I tried two of their pizzas and found them to be a little too dusty for me to enjoy and also underseasoned, but I have heard no such thing as a bad review of the place and I have to say it's rather perfect in so many other ways. Also, it could have been just mine that were served that way. Last night though we dined mostly on pasta and both of us were going nuts at how ridiculously good our two dishes were. Definitely go there if you can, and don't bother listening to what I was just saying about their pizza, I am full of opinions and personality, can't help it. The room is small, yet very stylish, with two paintings on the walls, one of which is very beautiful. Little glass chemistry beakers hold votive candles, the tables are made of a soft and comforting wood. The bathroom has a giant curio cabinet arranged with shells and bones and other objects. I'm a sucker for curio cabinets.

Flour + Water's dessert was much better than I could have done. A Rosemary Panna Cotta with a very loose blackberry compote accompanied by two dainty cornmeal cookies. I don't know about you but rosemary never fails to make me happy, and the way it innoculated the panna cotta was very interesting and the wild foresty berries partnered perfectly. The cornmeal cookies though, I didn't think much of them. I was reminded of my former Chef, Carlo Middione's recipe for Venetian Zalletti, which are much more delicate and light, with a subtly haunting lemony goodness to them.