Pasta
Triticum durum · Grain
1 varietyTop 10 pairings
A wheat-and-water dough, shaped and boiled. Classic dried pasta is hard, amber durum semolina that cooks to a firm, springy bite; fresh pasta is softer flour and egg. Mild and faintly sweet, it grips and carries sauce.
Picking a good onedrag
Amber, glassy, hard, faintly dusty wheatCrayon-stale, damp-clumped or webbed
Pantry standardEveryday bestBoil it hard in salted water. It carries gluten, so never cook it for anyone with coeliac disease.
Smell at the open boxNext to nothing: plain semolina
Which pasta, and what fromFresh egg pasta, chilled, in date
The strands themselvesPale and glossy: sauce slides off
A handful, and the corners of the boxA little semolina dust in the seam