By Francesca Arniotes
At Castles and Kitchens we make pasta. Lots of pasta. The miracle that is wheat, ground into flour and mixed with water, built civilization. The two proteins in wheat allow us to make the most delicate of pastries and the heartiest of breads. And pasta, which can be rolled, stuffed, layered, tossed and sauced, much to our delight, is the most fun to make and eat.
Historically, pasta’s great appeal is that it is easily made, takes up little storage space and it swells when cooked. It doesn’t need an oven, but simply a pot of water or oil. And unlike gruels and porridges, the earliest foods made with wheat, pasta doesn’t ferment.
Homemade, fresh, egg pasta is life-altering for sure. But it’s a mistake to think that dried pasta is inferior. In fact, quality dried pasta is the correct choice for many dishes. But all dried pasta is not created equal.
Noodle-making looks to have evolved independently in China, Africa, Greece, and with the Etruscans more than a thousand years Before the Common Era. Without dispute, Italy embraced and developed pasta culture to the highest degree beginning in the fifteenth century, elevating it to an art form in which hundreds of shapes and sizes, something like 400 of them, are thoughtfully paired with specific dressings and accompaniments. Both Naples in southern Italy and Bergamo in the north claim to be the originator of “macaroni”, or dried pasta. In fact, the regional pastas of Italy vary according to the type of wheat grown nearby. In the north, the pasta is made with a blend of soft wheats which yields a more delicate product. From this area come the fresh egg pastas we love to play at making in the C&K kitchen: long silky noodles as well as ravioli and other stuffed pastas folded into the shape of little hats, lambs with their noses between their feet, rings, braids and pillows. The south on the other hand traditionally uses durum wheat with its higher gluten content for strength and a hearty bite, milled coarsely, mixed simply with water. Naples is where the production of pasta on any kind of industrial scale began in the early 1400’s. This pasta did not keep well, as drying was sometimes incomplete, and yielded a brittle product. But around 1800, the present day drying process was discovered. It happened in a village a few miles south of Naples where the climate changes four times each day in a regular pattern. So it was discovered that a sequence of drying the pasta in alternating hot and cold temperatures with alternating moving air and still, over a number of days, led to the perfectly dried pastas that would keep indefinitely and stand up to boiling and tossing with sauces.
In the 1800’s bronze dies for extruding pasta were developed. The dough sticks to the rough surface of the metal as it is forced through a series of holes in the surface of the die and creates a coarse and pourous texture that holds onto the sauce, allowing each strand to be dressed. These dies led to the creation of shapes like rigatoni and bucatini. The use of these dies is still the standard in Italy. However, in the middle of the 20th century American pasta makers began to use Teflon dies for faster production. Teflon gives the pasta a slick, smooth surface that does not hold sauce. The days-long drying process, as discussed above, is also antithetical to American mass production’s need for speed. Along with the fact that US wheat is grown and processed differently than Italian wheat, these factors mean American brands simply do not cook the same way, so dressing a bowl of pasta in the Italian tradition is just not possible with a pasta product that is not made in Italy.
The slippery surface of the extruded noodles led to the American style of serving a pile of spaghetti topped with a ladle of chunky sauce on top. Tending to release starch to the outside, US-made pasta is often mushy and sticky, which gave rise to the practice of adding oil to the water, further defeating attempts at dressing the strands. Also rinsing the pasta after cooking to eliminate the excess starch is counterproductive to proper saucing.
So how to pasta like an Italian?
Buy only pasta labeled “made in or product of Italy”. “Italy’s favorite pasta” may be so, but here, it’s made in the USA. Rummo, La Molisana, De Cecco, Rustichella d’Abruzzo and Garofalo are good, readily available brands around here.
Look at cooking times on the package. If you compare two packages of linguine, for example, and one has a longer cooking time than the other, that one is the better pasta.
Bring plenty of water to a boil and then add a good measure of salt. No oil! For a half pound of pasta, I use 10-12 cups of water and a heaping tablespoon or so of salt. The water should taste salty. Get the water back to a boil ASAP once you add the pasta (I use a lid) and stir often.
Cook until there is a tiny pinprick of white remaining at the center of the pasta when you bite it. Don’t rinse. Scoop the pasta directly from the pot into the pan of sauce. Toss vigorously to emulsify and coat each piece, then serve at once. (Pasta waits for nobody!) If unsure, err on the side of undercooking because you can continue cooking in the sauce, adding the cooking water from the pot as the pasta absorbs it.
Choose great pasta and make it correctly and you’ll understand why Italians happily eat pasta every day! Learn, hands-on, more about making and eating delicious, authentic pasta dishes at the C&K kitchen.
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