Turkey Bolognese Sauce & Whole Wheat Pasta

This past weekend, I decided to make more homemade pasta and the same bolognese sauce I have made for a few months now. I have made this sauce so much now that I didn't need to look at the recipe this time around.

I started up the sauce as soon as I woke up so that it could simmer for 2-3 hours without affecting my hunger levels. I used two pounds of lean turkey instead of beef to make the sauce healthier. I seasoned the turkey well with Lawry's Seasoning Salt before adding it in the pot. After adding all of the other seasonings in the sauce, you will never know that the meat was turkey. Making this sauce is the best way to cook ground turkey.

While the sauce simmered, I made the pasta. I used a different recipe for this pasta than the one I used in the old post. With the addition of the whole wheat, the dough was harder to roll. I really need to work on making the dough thinner; they keep coming out too thick. Either way, the pasta tastes great.

I made the full recipe so that I could have leftover pasta to eat for the entire week. I still have sauce left but sadly there's no more homemade pasta. I had to use the store-bought stuff today. Even after eating this dish for about four or five days in a row, I am still not tired of it. I still have enough for one or two more days!

Both pasta recipes yielded basically the same result in taste and texture. I didn't notice a difference in taste outside of the addition of the wheat flour. I didn't use white wheat flour; I used the regular wheat flour.

Homemade Wheat Pasta
adapted from Big Red Kitchen

4 large eggs
scant amount of water
2 1/2 cups unbleached AP flour
1 cup whole wheat flour or white whole wheat flour

In a liquid measuring cup break eggs and whisk lightly. Add enough water to equal one cup liquid (with four eggs, I had almost exactly 1 cup). In a stand up mixer or on the countertop with your hands, mix the egg mixture with the flours until it pulls together into a dough. Turn onto a flour surface, knead lightly and cover with plastic wrap and let rest at least ten minutes. Then cut into pasta using whatever machine you like- electric, hand crack, or the old-fashioned way of rolling out and hand cutting. Use noodles immediately or dry slightly and then place in boiling water and cook 3-5 minutes or until al dente. Pasta not cooked immediately can be stored in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for one week or frozen I guess up to 6 months. (I hung my pasta on hangers for a few hours before storing the pasta.)