Pasta To Me Is A Canvas On Which A Great Chef May Paint. I Like to serve a small amount of light, delicate pasta that has many ingredients on top of it-the painting.

In a mixing bowl or on a smooth work surface, combine the flour and salt and make a well in the center.

Put the egg yolks in the well. With your fingertips or a fork, break the yolks and gradually incorporate the flour into them, working from the center outward, to form a smooth, firm but still pliable dough. (If you like, you could also combine the ingredients in a food processor with the metal blade.) Gather the dough into a ball, then flatten it to a thickness of about l/2 inch.

Set the rollers of a hand-cranked pasta machine at their widest seffing. Lightly dust the dough with additional flour on both sides and crank it through the machine. Fold both ends of the dough toward each other, overlapping them. Rotate the dough 90 degrees, dust with flour again, and crank it through once more. Continue until the dough is smooth and firm. Decrease the roller width by one setting and pass the dough through again. Continue, rolling the dough thinner and thinner, until the rollers are only about /8 inch apart (usually the next-to-narrowest setting).

Pass the sheet of dough through an angel hair pasta cutter, cutting them into thin strands. Lightly toss the angel hair with a little flour to keep the strands separate.

To cook the pasta, bring 8 quarts of lightly salted water to a boil in a large pot. Add 3 tablespoons of olive oil. Put the angel hair pasta in a sieve and lower it into the water, stirring with tongs or a spoon to keep the strands separate. Boil until al dense, cooked but still slightly chewy-no more than 2 minutes for freshly made pasta. Drain and toss with sauce as instructed in the recipe.