My Guest Blogger: DoBianchi's Take on Fresh Pasta

To complete my pasta series with style (you can see part 1 here and part 2 here) I enlisted the help of my own resident smarty pants, Jeremy Parzen. In addition to having spent a number of years in Northern Italy, he has a doctorate in Italian Literature. His authoritative voice on all things pasta and Petrachan will impress you for sure...worked for me!

Take it away, DoBianchi...

I cannot conceal that when Tracie B asked me to guest blog at My Life Italian, I was thrilled. I mean, after all, who wouldn't be honored to contribute to the blog of the woman who wrote a line I wish I wrote, about happy vines she saw in Ischia: If I were a vine, I would grow here. Her innate gifts as a writer, her humor, honesty, and honed palate, and — above all — her insights and perspective into the "garden of Europe" — the bel paease — the fair country are what made me fall for her in the first place. The title of her blog alone still makes me melt. Hey, Tracie B, you had me at hello… Or should I say, ciao?

One of the fun things about our relationship and our shared Italophilia is how she lived in Southern Italy, while I lived in the North. When we talk together in Italian, it's a veritable Tower of Babel: she, the belle from Orange, Texas speaks with a rich, musical Neapolitan accent, and I, from San Diego, speak with a nasaly, sharp Veneto accent!

When she posted the other day about the preference and tradition of "dried pasta," pastasciutta, in Southern Italy, she suggested that I write something about the fresh pasta that prevails in Emilia. So, I wrote to my friend Dindo in Bologna, and asked him to take some photographs of his mother making the fresh pasta that she makes nearly every day.

It's not that people in the North don't eat dried pasta. As a matter of fact, the Emilians are very proud of their Barilla, which is based in their region. But fresh lasagne and tagliatelle reign supreme there, as do a wide variety of stuffed fresh pastas — ravioli, tortelli, tortellini, cappelletti, etc.

Historically, dried pasta has its origins in Southern Italy. In Maestro Martino's 15th-century cookbook The Art of Cooking (which I translated for University of California Press, 2005), he includes a recipe for a dried pasta that resemble today's fusilli. He calls it "Sicilian macaroni" and instructs the reader to dry it in the sun, adding that it can last for up to three years. It's very likely that the warmer temperatures of the South and the ventilation provided by the sea are among the factors that would make Gragnano near Naples the unrivalled center for the production of dried pasta by the mid-18th century.

In landlocked Emilia, humidity and colder temperatures are factors in a unique macroclimate that gives us a variety of culinary wonders, like Parmigiano Reggiano. Did you know, for example, that you can replicate the methods for making Parmigiano Reggiano elsewhere in the world, but it only gets that unique texture and consistency when made in the foggy, damp provinces of Parma and Reggio Emilia (where the smell of pig poop is ubiquitous)?

There are other reasons why the Emilians still favor fresh pasta but the geography and climate alone are a big part of why fresh pasta prevails in the North.

Here is Signora Corradino's method for making garganelli, with ridges of course!


After you've rolled the pasta out, you cut it into squares.


Then you roll those around a wooden rod (this is similar to Maestro Martino's technique for Sicilian macaroni).


Then you make the ridges — so important in order for the sauce to penetrate the pasta — using a specially made pasta loom.

Keeping it Italian: 'A Past' Asciutt' Pt 1

Misconception Americans have about Italian food #32b, Section 2:

Fresh pasta is superior/preferred to dried pasta, the latter being merely a convenient substitute for the unskilled and lazy.

Many times I have heard people say, "But fresh pasta is definitely better." Well, not exactly. I will start by saying that fresh pasta is a more Northern tradition, while dried pasta is a more Southerly thang.

The absolute Mecca for fresh pasta is without a doubt, Emilia-Romagna. That being said, all regions, no matter their Latitudinal persuasion, boast their own fresh pasta. (In Naples, they have eggless scialatielli, made with regular flour and water, typically dressed with frutti di mare...yum!)

Dried and fresh pasta have two very different but equally important uses. For example, no Italian in her right mind would EVER make a puttanesca with fresh pasta (click here to read DoBianchi's excellent history on this misunderstood sauce). On the other hand, who ever heard of dried ravioli? Spaghetti/penne with fresh tomatoes would not be the same without perfectly al dente, high-quality dried pasta.

Since I am a girl of the south, on both sides of the Atlantic, we'll concentrate on the latter. (In my series Keeping it Italian, we'll focus on how to get the good stuff right here at home.)

There are a few indicators of quality to help you navigate a grocery isle (stay away from anything that says "noodles" unless you're making Asian food, please.) The most important is the surface of the pasta, whatever shape it may be. It must-a to be ruvido (that means rough), not like sandpaper, but a bit like the fine side of a fingernail file. This helps the sauce adhere to the pasta, clinging to the hope of making your mouth happy.

Buy one of those bags of 79 cent "noodles" when you buy your good spaghetti. You'll feel the difference!

The second, which reveals itself only after cooking, is the integrity of the pasta. If it falls apart when you stir it with the sauce, it is too old. It may have been a fine bag of love in its prime, but it's a sign that your grocer isn't turning over his stock.

**Digression alert**
One more thing, and this is a personal preference, but I believe with my entire Texan being that all "cut" pasta (penne, ziti, rigatoni, etc) should be ridged, or rigata. There is nothing uglier than a plate of smooth penne, espesh when one or two are broken. Why have Lays when you can have Ruffles? Why would you forgo the extra fun of added texture for the flat and boring landscape of liscia (smooth)?

Back to business...

Must we spend 5-7 dollars a pound on Rustichella d'Abruzzo to get it right? Maybe. This is terrific pasta, but this starch's humble purpose in the kitchen becomes a luxury when it should be a nutritious and everyday option.

In most supermarkets you can find DeCecco, which is a fine product, though industrial, but I use it regularly. My favorite, however, is I SapORI di Napoli (this is a bit of a word-play, sapori means flavors, the capitalized ori is the plural of oro, which means gold). I found in this brand what I had been looking for since I returned from Italia. It's made in Caserta (just outside of Naples) and feels like a true artisan pasta.

Otherwise, Garofolo is great AND made in Gragnano. This Southern Italian town is home to panuozzi, eponymous fizzy red wine, and it is molto famous for its dried pasta...

Please stay tuned for Part 2 where we'll talk about cooking the pasta!