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    April 20, 2020

    Stinging Nettle Pasta

    Stinging nettle pasta adds great color and some added nutrition to your pasta dishes.

    Stinging nettle adds great color to any homemade pasta dish

    How many of you have started foraging now that we are in lockdown? Since there are no longer frequent visits to the grocery store – in fact none in our case since we are ordering everything for home delivery - there’s always something you forget to order. Plus grocery stores are not as well-stocked as they were before lockdown. We're blessed with a large piece of land so we're doing a lot more foraging than we did in the past: things like cicoria, calamint, lots of herbs, wild garlic, arugula and stinging nettle. I use stinging nettle frequently to make soups and different kinds of stinging nettle pasta. It adds nutritional greens to your pasta and a lot of beautiful color!

    Stinging nettle is great for soups and to add color to pasta!

    Make sure you wear gloves when you pick and wash the stinging nettle because it does sting! As soon as you cook the stinging nettle the sting goes away. Cook it as you would for spinach: in a large covered pot with just a small bit of water (⅓ cup) only until wilted.

    Cooking stinging nettle

    There are two important things to remember when you use these greens to add color to your stinging nettle pasta. First, make sure you squeeze the greens until almost bone dry. I use an inexpensive dish towel to do this:

    Use a dish towel to twist and squeeze out excess liquid from greens before using to make pasta

    My husband twists the towel in one direction and I twist in the other and it sure makes the process a lot faster and more efficient! Here's what a pot full of cooked stinging nettle reduces to once it's squeezed dry:

    Stinging nettle squeezed dry for stinging nettle pasta

    The second thing is to finely mince the stinging nettle. That way it blends into the pasta dough beautifully! Bear in mind that the stinging nettle, no matter how dry you get it, will still add a bit of moisture to your dough. Consequently you may need to sprinkle in additional flour as needed so the dough achieves the right consistency. Follow my recipe for basic pasta and take a look at my post on stinging nettle fettuccine for recipes and technique details!

    Your ball of stinging nettle pasta dough will look like this:

    Stinging nettle pasta dough

    You'll need a dough scraper for your pasta board or work surface.
    If you don't have a pasta machine to roll out your pasta then you should probably get one if you enjoy making homemade pasta!
    After the pasta is made I dry it out on this pasta drying rack:

    Stinging nettle spaghetti adds gorgeous green color to any pasta dish!

    You can serve stinging nettle pasta with almost any kind of sauce. I especially love it with my amatriciana sauce, or cherry tomatoes and fried eggplant or even alla Carbonara!
    Or just a simple tomato sauce sprinkled with Parmesan cheese.

    Stinging nettle homemade spaghetti with tomato sauce and Parmesan cheese

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    stinging nettle spaghetti

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    stinging nettle spaghetti adds color and nutrition to your dish!

    PIN THIS ON PINTEREST OR ADD TO YOUR INSTAGRAM STORY!

    stinging nettle spaghetti adds color and nutrition to your dish!

    I make a small commission on purchases made through links on my website. Prices are identical for you, but purchasing through my links helps support my work to bring you great recipes, culinary and travel information.

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    About

    Wendy at Roscioli
    I’m American and I’ve lived in Italy for nearly four decades with my Italian family. My passion and strength lies in sharing Italian stories, recipes and unique travel insights on my blog, my Flavor of Italy trips and tours, newsletter and podcast. Continue Reading...

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