Authentic Italian Pasta

When Cindy Vickery was in Australia she learned to make Authentic Italian Pasta.
She sent me a few notes about it....and I am cleaning up my email and decided to put the notes here for safe keeping.
Today, I went to the home of a lady in our branch (Italian) and had her show me how to make ravioli. We made enough dough to make fetuccini and cannelloni as well!!!! ") She also made a creamy cheese sauce that is so yummy....I hope I can make it as good sometime. Now I'm ready to buy a pasta maker. Sure makes it thin and pretty.

Hi! Well, Milva uses a hand pasta maker that is imported from Italy. She told me that I should get one before coming back over....:) Spoken like a true Italian of course! :) I was wondering about a kitchen aide one....but have decided I'd go with what the `pro' suggests. It sits on your counter and is hand cranked. One side makes flat sheets and then there are two cutters on the opposite side for fetuccini and a smaller one for a spagehtti size. Using the same egg pasta dough, you can make all of these different types of pasta. Cannelloni are tubes...you cut a rectangle looking piece about 4"x3", fill them with a filling, roll and lay them in a dish as for enchiladas and bake them in a sauce.....we used the same filling today as for the ravioli which was a spinach/ricada cheese one, but you can use a meat filling as well. One thing I've learned here, there are a dozen or more common Italian sauces that you can serve your pasta with. When I came here I had no clue how many there were....I have been so used to using only a tomato based spagehtti sauce with ground beef which is a Bolanaise sauce. Today we made this creamy cheese one that uses...butter, blue cheese, grated parmesan cheese and cream, thickened with a little cornstarch and water. Wow. Good. I just came to the computer to write down the recipes when I read your e-mail. I need to convert the grams into cups and oz. Milva doesn't measure anything...I sortof estimated amounts as she put them in. She also told me of a pasta dish where you saute mushrooms, green pepper, sundried tomatoes and sliced black olives in olive oil with a little basil and salt. When done, mix with hot cooked pasta and loose (freshly grated) parmesan cheese (probably 1 cup???). Mix the cheese with the hot vegies and pasta to melt. Serve. Sounds easy, but good huh. Everything Milva makes is wonderful. I probably have ten different things that she has taught me while here. I'm going to put them into a `Milva Cookbook' and when I get it done, I will share it with you ! ")