How to cook pasta properly

Here is some advice for pasta that's properly cooked and doesn't stick.

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For1 pasta dish 2 pastas dish 3 pastas dish

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For 1 pasta dish, you will need:

water
pasta
coarse salt
1 tablespoon olive oil (optional)

Nutritional information:

Whole recipe

Calories

135

Proteins

Carbohydrates

Fats

15g

Per 100 g

Calories

900

45%

Proteins

Carbohydrates

Fats

100g

15%

% are calculated relative to a Recommended Dietary Intake or RDI of 2000 k-calories by day for a woman (change to a man).

Times:

Preparation : 16 min.
Cooking : 8 min.
Start to finish : 24 min.

Preservation : Several days in the fridge, in a closed jar.

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How much will it cost?

For 1 pasta dish : 0.06 €

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Step by step recipe:

Boil a large pan of water. When boiling, salt with a tablespoon of coarse salt for 2 litres water. A large quantity of water is needed to prevent pasta from sticking on the bottom of the pan. If you like precise numbers, here is the 1-10-100 rule: 1 litre water, to 10 g salt, to 100 g pasta.
Add a tablespoon olive oil.
When water comes back to the boil, add pasta all at once.
You can also add a rosemary bunch in the water.
Stir and leave to cook uncovered for the time indicated on the pasta packet (usually 8-9 minutes, but it depend on type of pasta). The best way is to taste near end of cooking. It's very important not to overcook pasta, otherwise it becomes too soft and unpleasant. Italians, pasta masters since Marco Polo, call this ideal texture "al dente". During cooking, stir once or twice to prevent pasta sticking.
After this time, remove pasta from water immediately and transfer to a strainer to drain, or pour the whole panful into a colander or strainer. Chefs will tell you that it's better to remove pasta from water, instead of pouring everything into a strainer, because this keeps the gluten (released during cooking) in the water instead of on the pasta, and it's this gluten that makes it sticky.
When pasta is drained, discard cooking water and put pasta back into the pan.
If you plan to use pasta right away, it's ready. If not, add a tablespoon of olive oil, mix well, cover and leave to stand, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking. Note: because it's kept hot and covered, pasta will continue cooking, so you should not keep it too long.

Remarks:

It's quite surprising to see how many ways of preparing and serving pasta there are, and at the same time how great a simple pasta dish can be: a pan of spaghetti, a dash of olive oil, some grated Parmesan, what more do we need? hummm, oh yes, a good glass of Italian wine perhaps...

Source:

Home made.

Last modified on: May 2^nd 2013

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