You’ve all been loving our handmade noodle recipes so far, like our homemade egg noodles and handmade white noodles. But what about handmade spinach noodles?
These spinach noodles aren’t just a fun color, they’re a great way to add a little bit of extra veg to your meal, without sacrificing flavor or texture.
Versatility!
Fresh green spinach noodles are harder to find in grocery stores, so it’s great to make them at home. What’s more, you can use these noodles in Chinese dishes (noodle soups or tossed noodle dishes) OR as pasta in Italian-style dishes. You could even use this dough to make ravioli or tortellini.
In fact, that’s exactly what I did when I blogged this recipe. I took half the batch to make Chinese cold noodles, and half the batch to make a big ol’ plate of creamy Fettuccine Alfredo. If that’s not a versatile recipe, I don’t know what is.
Two Ways to Roll & Cut
These noodles can be rolled and cut using a mechanical pasta maker (either a hand crank version or a Kitchen-Aid attachment). However, if you don’t have that equipment in your kitchen, you can just use a rolling pin to hand-roll these and a knife to cut them.
In either scenario, just make sure you’re thoroughly flouring both sides of the dough throughout the rolling and cutting process to ensure they don’t stick together.
Key Tips for Perfect Spinach Noodles
Just a quick reminder of our most important tips when making noodles:
- Be patient as the dough comes together, and do not add more water. The flour needs time to absorb the moisture from the added water, so the dough will initially look a bit dry. Just be patient, and don’t add any additional liquid, or the noodles will come out sticky and gummy.
- Flour often when rolling and cutting, so the noodles don’t stick together.
- Roll very thinly! This is especially important if you’re hand-rolling. Just remember that the noodles will expand when cooked, so the dough needs to be rolled out very thinly––about 2mm thick.
- Measure by weight! Measuring by weight using a digital kitchen scale will give you the most consistent results. This is especially important when it comes to this recipe, because the spinach in the recipe has moisture in it, and you don’t want too much or too little added moisture. Measuring an irregularly shaped ingredient like baby spinach using cups is going to have a lot of variability.
Spinach Noodles: Recipe Instructions
Ideally, weigh out the spinach. You should have 60 grams (about 2 cups packed).
Add the baby spinach and water to a blender or food processor.
Blend at high speed until completely smooth.
Add the bread flour and salt to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment (or a large regular mixing bowl) and whisk together to incorporate. Again, weighing out the ingredients will get you the most consistent results.
Turn the mixer on low speed, and gradually add the spinach mixture in two batches, giving the flour time to absorb the water with each addition. If doing this by hand, simply stir with your hands as you gradually add the liquid.
The mixture will eventually form a shaggy, green dough after 5 minutes of kneading.
If the mixer fails to bring it all together, turn off the mixer and push the dough together with your hands.
Once the dough has formed a relatively cohesive ball (it will look lumpy), continue to knead with the mixer for 10 minutes or by hand for 15 minutes. Avoid the temptation to add additional water, as this will affect the texture of your noodles.
After additional kneading, the dough will eventually look like this:
I did not add any additional water to get from that dry looking dough in the last photo to the smooth, hydrated dough in the photo above.
Cover the dough with an overturned bowl, and allow it to rest for 30 minutes. During this time, it will continue to absorb moisture and become more stretchy and workable.
After the dough has rested, knead it by hand for a few seconds to remove any air bubbles. Form into a ball on a floured surface.
Cut it in half. Take each dough half, and roll into a thin sheet on a floured surface, about 2mm thick. You can do this by hand with a rolling pin or with a pasta roller.
As you can see below, I did one half of the dough with the pasta roller…
And the other half with a rolling pin:
Flour the surface of the dough sheets thoroughly, flip over, and flour the other sides as well.
Once floured, fold the dough so you have 4 layers. Slice the noodles with a sharp knife to your desired thickness. We decided to cut them about ⅛-inch thick.
You can also run them through the pasta cutting attachment of your pasta roller. Thoroughly flouring both sides will help them cut cleanly.
When the noodles have been cut, toss them in flour to keep them from sticking.
Bring a pot of water to a boil and cook the noodles for 1 to 3 minutes, depending on the thickness. Keep an eye on the noodles as they cook and taste them to determine when they’re cooked (there is a lot of variation depending on how thinly they were rolled and cut, so test in real time to determine when they’re done).
Serve in soup or with sauce as desired! You can also use the noodles as pasta, or make them into ravioli or tortellini!
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Recipe
Spinach Noodles
Ingredients
- 60 g baby spinach (about 2 cups packed)
- 150 ml water (about 2/3 cup)
- 330 g bread flour (also known as strong flour or high-gluten flour, about 2 ¼ U.S. cups)
- 1/4 teaspoon salt (1.5g)
Instructions
- Add the baby spinach and water to a blender or food processor, and blend at high speed until completely smooth.
- Add the bread flour and salt to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment (or a large regular mixing bowl) and whisk together to incorporate.
- Turn the mixer on low speed, and gradually add the spinach mixture in two batches, giving the flour time to absorb the water with each addition. If doing this by hand, simply stir with your hands as you gradually add the liquid.
- The mixture will eventually form a shaggy, green dough after 5 minutes of kneading. If the mixer fails to bring it all together, turn off the mixer and push the dough together with your hands.
- Once the dough has formed a relatively cohesive ball (it will look lumpy), continue to knead with the mixer for 10 minutes or by hand for 15 minutes. Avoid the temptation to add additional water, as this will affect the texture of your noodles.
- Cover the dough with an overturned bowl, and allow it to rest for 30 minutes. During this time, it will continue to absorb moisture and become more stretchy and workable.
- After the dough has rested, knead it by hand for a few seconds to remove any air bubbles. Form into a ball and cut it in half.
- Take each dough half, and roll into a thin sheet on a floured surface, about 2mm thick. Flour the surface thoroughly, flip over, and flour the other side as well. You can do this by hand with a rolling pin or with a pasta roller.
- If hand-cutting, fold the dough so you have 4 layers. Slice the noodles with a sharp knife to your desired thickness. We decided to cut them about ⅛-inch thick. As you’re cutting the noodles, gently separate them out with your hands and toss them in flour so they don’t stick. You can also pass them through a pasta cutting attachment.
- Bring a pot of water to a boil and cook the noodles for 1 to 3 minutes, depending on the thickness. Keep an eye on the noodles as they cook and taste them to determine when they’re cooked (there is a lot of variation depending on how thinly they were rolled and cut, so test in real time to determine when they’re done). Serve in soup or with sauce as desired, or use in pasta dishes!
Nutrition Facts
