pasta

One of Italy's greatest gifts to the world, and a culinary science unto itself: each region, and sometimes each valley, each village has its own form, or slight variant, or slightly different way of saying the same thing. And that's just the shape; add endless variants on endless types of broth or sugo or ragù and it's enough to drive your honest Italian food decoders crazy (that's pazzo, or matto).

What makes Italian dried pasta so good is that it's made with durum wheat semolina, raised in the Mediterranean sun; it gives the pasta its slightly rough, sauce-clinging texture.

Somewhat confusingly, pasta can also mean the filling that goes inside ravioli etc, as well as any kind of dough or batter, or even paste, as in English (ie pasta di mandorle, or almond paste). It also refers to a pastry or the curd of a cheese.

pasta in bianco: plain, with just butter or olive oil