If there is one ingredient that almost everyone has had and that almost everyone can come back to, it’s pasta. I remember my puerile youth when spaghetti was about the only thing I would eat and the only thing my mother could feed me. In that sense, I grew up on pasta. But it wasn’t until I began cooking pasta myself that I realized the world of dishes you can create off of this one ingredient. With that said, there are, I believe, some pasta guidelines that create perfect pasta dishes. These rules are for the noodles themselves. Americans often forget that the main star of any pasta dish should be the pasta, not the sauce. So don’t go slathering your noodles in gallons of marinara. The sauce is of course important but that’s a whole other article.
Here are a few rules for pasta I believe you should follow with every pasta dish. Of course there are exceptions, but in general these rules will create quality pasta dishes.
In all the dishes you make it is extremely important so season every layer. If you’re sautéing vegetables, for example, always add more salt and pepper with each of addition of a vegetable. Pasta is no exception. The Italians knew what they were saying when they said the water you cook pasta in should taste like the sea.
2)Don’t rinse your pasta once it’s done straining.
Pasta, when cooked, contains wonderful starches. These starches can thicken a dish and ensure that every noodle is coated in sauce. Therefore you never want to rinse pasta; the water will strip the noodles of it starches. The water you cook your pasta in also contains a good amount of this starch, so save a cup of it when cooking because you can always add it to a weak or thin looking sauce.
3)Cook your pasta with your sauce.
A mistake my father makes every time he cooks spaghetti (the one dish he knows how to cook) is that he never adds the spaghetti noodles to his marinara sauce. This last step in the cooking process allows for the pasta to really absorb the sauces flavor. It ultimately creates one dish instead of just pasta and sauce.
4)Your pasta should be appropriate for your sauce
When buying pasta at the store, always take into consideration the sauce you are going to cook the pasta in. Longer noodles like spaghetti and linguine, generally, take better to marinara and red sauces, while shorter pasta like penne and shells favor white sauces, and pesto. Of course this isn’t law. Any pasta can be mixed with any sauce, but the better home cooks will choose the pasta that will enhance their dish.
Follow these guidelines and your pasta dishes will always be better in the end. Below is a link to a pasta dish that is simple and that everyone should be able to enjoy.
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Farfalle-with-Peas-and-Pancetta-101771
No comments:
Post a Comment