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Rigatoni Rigatoni is by far the superior pasta shape for hearty sauces. A meat sauce is great because you can scoop up the sauce into the pasta. Very simple tubular design, so it’s aesthetics are pleasing to the minimalist. Perfect to snack on as well. San Giorgio has many small grooves along the pasta, making its texture much more pleasant than the Barilla brand with the wide grooves. A+ |
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Rotini Second only to rigatoni, rotini’s spiral shape makes it an ideal sauce conveyor as well. The absence of the scooping factor makes it slightly inferior, but again it is easy and fun to snack on. Rotini is good for cream sauces and pasta salads in a way that rigatoni is not, because it won’t cause the sauce to bubble out unexpectedly. Its design is fun, but a bit too complex to be regarded entirely as food. B+ |
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Angel Hair One of the weakest pasta choices. The chunky tomato sauces that I prefer don’t stick to it well, and unless cooked precisely right it becomes a sticky mass of ugly noodles. It looks like intestines. C – |
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Macaroni The poor white trash of the pasta family. Does it get any more boring than macaroni? Yankee Doodle was the best use of this pasta. Sure the ubiquitous cheese can be served just fine with this pasta, but other than being a college pantry staple, macaroni is a disgrace to the pasta family. D+ |
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Farfelle Vulgarized as “bow ties” this pasta is the most attractive to the eye. Who can resist a pasta salad made with farfelle? These butterflies are great in a chunky sauce with sausage. B |
Reposted by MF, guest Blogger
3 Responses
Farfelle’s whimsical shape notwithstanding, I can’t get the damn stuff to cook right. I boil it like mad and the crinkled middle portion is still tough and chewy (not al dente–just plain raw).
You can also take the perspective that pasta can rise above it’s role as a vehicle for sauce. I had fresh porcini linguine (in the freezer case at Sfizi Deli) with a light coating of marinara and it turned my pasta world upside down. For the first time, pasta was a real player on my plate instead of the mandatory tagalong and I couldn’t believe what I’d been missing all these years…
I know this sounds silly, but that toughness is what I dig about farfelle so much- i guess i just like my food to put up a decent fight.
Which explains my preference for really hard beef jerky. and live chickens.