Oat Flour for pasta not rolling well?

Question

I experimented by substituting all purpose flour with oat flour that I ground up myself from organic oatmeal for pasta intended for ravioli.

I used roughly 3 cups of oat flour : 4 eggs ratio, Kneeded it into dough, let it rest for 30 minutes before attempting to roll it in my pasta roller.

The problem is I couldn't get the texture right, plus the oat flour kept absorbing all the moisture and became dry, brittle and unrollable.

Adding more water made it too moist and sticky that I know it would get stuck in my pasta roller. Kneeding water or more flour into the dough made it eventually dry and brittle again.

The oat flour dough is like a weird sponge! I can't get the texture right.

What am I doing wrong?

I've made pasta from all purpose flour before and have not had this problem.

EDIT: Just experimenting because I had extra Oatmeal on hand. I don't have Gluten sensitivity.

Answer 1

Pasta relies on gluten development for its strength and structure. Only wheat and its close relatives have the necessary precursor proteins, glutenin and gliadin, from which gluten is formed.

You simply will not be able to make pasta from 100% oat flour using a recipe designed for wheat flour, as oats do not contain gluten (well, technically, its precursors).

If you desire a gluten free pasta, you should search for recipes specifically for that purpose. They are often bound together with xantham gum or other hydrocolloids.

If you are just looking for an interesting pasta as an alternative to the more traditional ones, you need to make sure you have enough gluten available to support the structure (and overcome the weakening that will come from using oat flour, which will physically interrupt the gluten strands). I would suggest making sure you are using high protein wheat flour (such as bread flour), and only substituting a portion (no more than say 25%, and you might want to start with smaller amounts to see how it works) with oat flour. I haven't tried this, so you will need to experiment to find a good balance between oat flavor, and the ability for the pasta to hold its shape and structure.

Answer 2

I made oat flour pasta today and I had the same struggles in the past but found using very little water and xanthan gum works. I used about 3/4 cups homemade oats flour, pinch of salt, about 1/4 tsp Xanthan gum, 1 egg, few drops olive oil and about 3 tsp chilled water. This is very important for the texture. I started with half a cup of oats flour, mixed the wet ingredients to the dry and used the last 1/4 cup of flour to add while mixing and kneading.Once the dough came together, I used a few drops of olive oil to coat the dough and the table. Once rolled out to 2mm thickness, cliced it up and laid out to dry. Really no problem this time.

Answer 3

Pasta does not need glutein. In fact in east plenty of gluten free flours (rice, bean flours) have been used for making noodles without wheat. Oat is one of them, which is traditional for Inner Mongolia (part of China).

What I recommend is using enough water - and not necessary eggs att all. Oat has plenty of protein itself and like durum it does not need eggs to make pasta. On the other hand it tends to absorb more fluid than wheat, so if it seems to dry, just add water.

Answer 4

I would recommend not leaving the dough to rest. Roll it right away as it will harden if left.

Answer 5

I second SAJ14SAJ but have my disagreement on oat flour vs all purpose.

Oats do have gluten and in fact 14% gluten so unless you are using a gluten free oat flour you should use similar amounts as you would whole wheat flour because of similar percentages.