Mix the eggs, oil and water together in a large bowl. Sift the flour, gluten and salt together into the egg/oil/water mixture. Gather it all up into a dough, and knead it until it is smooth and elastic, this takes about 10 minutes.

Wrap the ball in plastic and leave it to rest for at least an hour before rolling. The dough will benefit from being stored in the refrigerator overnight, if this is possible.

The size of the eggs governs the amount of water needed. Jumbo eggs need less water.

Using a pasta machine:
Break off a piece of dough about 50mm diameter, the size of a billiard ball, knead it in your hand and then roll it through the noodle machine. Start at the widest setting, folding the sheet over a couple of times and passing through the same roller setting. Then reduce the roller gap gradually until the desired thickness is reached. Start at the widest, then reduce the gap in steps, finally use the narrowest setting. It may be necessary to dust the sheets with flour if the dough is too soft.

I roll each piece at the one thickness setting, close up the rollers one notch, and then put all of the sheets through that narrower gap. It’s quicker that way.

When the sheets are the required thickness, rest them on wire racks to let the air circulate all around. At this stage, the pasta can be used for lasagne.

The dough needs to be fairly dry and firm before cutting, but not so dry that it cracks - it should bend easily.

The sheets can now be cut into fettucine - use the slitting rollers and catch the strips over a wooden spoon handle, or a finger!. Immediately drop them into boiling salted water which has a little oil added. Cook for the minimum time to reach al dente.

Do not store the pasta away until it is quite dry, hard and brittle, it goes mouldy if you‘re not careful.

Judith Olney's “Entertainments” has a richer mixture, using 3 extra egg yolks.

Durum or fine semolina is the traditional flour for pasta, but we have bulk bread flour at home all the time, it works OK for us!

There are techniques of making coloured pasta by adding blanched spinach, tomato, carrot, beetroot or even squid ink to the basic dough! You will need to adjust the amount of liquid added to compensate for the moisture in the vegetables.

Try 3 cups of flour and three eggs - only! Nothing else, just flour and egg.

Pasta Verde:
125 g, 4 oz Spinach
Wash it and trim off the stems, cook for 5 minutes. Drain and strain off all the liquid, squeeze it in your hand if necessary. Chop the mass finely, add it to the liquid and incorporate into the flour and egg mixture.
(I don’t think it's worth the effort - it just looks like army camouflage pasta!)

Black Pepper Pasta    Pasta al pepe:
Add 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper the dry ingredients.

Pasta Rosa:
Replace some of the water with two tablespoons of tomato puree to the liquid. You may need to adjust the total liquids