Pasta machine rolls dough wider than machine
I have a (admittedly rather cheap) pasta roller that I try to use fairly regularly. The issue is that when I am rolling it out,the dough keeps getting wider, not just longer, beyond the size of the rollers, and then getting all mangled at the edges. It also has a hard time feeding in straight. Every video I watch on pasta making doesn't seem to show this, so it is just some trick they aren't mentioning, the cheap machine, or what?
Best Answer
You might be rolling the dough too thinly, too soon. Start by feeding a somewhat flattened 'disk' of dough through the pasta machine at its widest setting. Change the setting by at most 1 for each subsequent pass.
You might also benefit from 'laminating' the dough: after the first pass, fold the dough in thirds, turn it 90 degrees and pass it through the machine again. Here is a picture demonstrating the procedure from the Serious Eats "Science of the Best Fresh Pasta" guide.
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Quick Answer about "Pasta machine rolls dough wider than machine"
You might be rolling the dough too thinly, too soon. Start by feeding a somewhat flattened 'disk' of dough through the pasta machine at its widest setting. Change the setting by at most 1 for each subsequent pass.How thick should pasta pasta roller be?
Continue tightening the setting to the desired thickness for the pasta and continue feeding the dough through. We recommend not exceeding a setting of \u201c3\u201d or \u201c4\u201d for cut pasta such as spaghetti or linguine. For lasagna pasta, if you desire thin sheets, then go as low as a \u201c1\u201d or \u201c2\u201d setting.Why is it important to roll the dough several times through the pasta maker?
By rolling it through a pasta machine several times you're actually helping the gluten to develop even further and structure into nice flat sheets. You can also do it by hand, but a pasta roller really is a lot easier for making those very thin smooth sheets.Can you overwork pasta dough?
A well-kneaded dough is stretchy and elastic to work with, but also tender and delicate when you bite into it after cooking. Overworked dough, on the other hand, feels tight and tough. This is because kneading the dough too much will cause damage to the gluten molecules, which give it its elasticity.Why is my pasta dough falling apart?
So what causes pasta dough to tear and form holes when rolling? The primary reason is that the dough is not being rolled, folded and fed in properly on the correct settings of the pasta roller. If the dough is not flat enough, fed in at the wrong angle, or too fast through the roller, it can bunch up and rip.Homemade fresh pasta with Marcato Atlas 150 Classic - Video tutorial
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Answer 2
(note -- I haven't rolled out pasta with a machine in 20 years or so, but I used to do it a few times a year with my mom)
I think this might be a sign that you need to let you pasta rest more, as it's not elongating easily.
If you don't have the time to do that, you can take a knife and cut the strip in half, with the assumption that they're going to get wider as you keep working it.
You can also fold it lengthwise for your last pass while you're working it on the widest setting before you start getting it down to the thickness you want.
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