Lesson Plan #4

Homemade Pasta with Pumpkin Sauce

We had an amazing week of pasta making! Flour everywhere along with smiling faces. I had one child comment, "at home my mom never let's us use flour because it's messy!". It truly made me laugh! I get it. I don't like my kids making messes for me at home either. What would a cooking class be without a mess? Not a fun and exciting class ;)

The kids learned how to make a simple pasta dough. They were taught that they need to allow the pasta to rest 30 mins. after mixing and before kneading to allow the gluten to relax so that the dough will roll out easily. If you do not let the gluten relax, you will find that the dough is springy and elastic, causing it to bounce back when you roll it. If this happens, wrap or cover the dough with plastic wrap to keep it from drying out, and let it rest 10-30 mins. We did not have time to allow our pasta to rest. 

I allowed the kids to choose the size of their noodles and away we went, everyone had a turn kneading their peace of dough and flattening it in the pasta machine and then cranking the handle and feeding the pasta dough into the machine and voila, created their own noodles.  

The kids learned how to infuse olive oil using whole garlic cloves, fresh rosemary and pepper flakes. Oh the smell was heavenly!!! 

We created a pumpkin sauce that was simply devine. Every child including the non pumpkin eaters liked it! We garnish it with raw pepitas (pumpkin seeds) that we roasted in a pan without adding any oil to it. 

I recommended that the kids who create this recipe at home, use coconut milk in the sauce or add veggies and chicken to the sauce or try it the way we made it and have it for a Meatless Monday! 

Overall, the pasta dish was a success! I'm getting to know all the kids better. All the different personalities are such a blessing and bring so much to the class.