The Two Fundamental Kinds of Pasta

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Marcella Cucina

By Marcella Hazan

Published 1997

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There are two broad categories within which are grouped all but a few of the regional pasta specialties: There is homemade pasta produced by hand, or with hand-operated tools, using soft wheat flour and eggs; and there is industrially made, boxed pasta produced with semolina— hard wheat flour—and water.

Homemade egg pasta includes all the flat noodles—fettuccine, tagliatelle, pappardelle, tonnarelli, lasagne—and the stuffed pastas; ravioli, tortellini, tortelloni, agnolotti, pansoti.

When speaking of boxed semolina pasta we refer to such solid shapes as spaghetti, spaghettini, linguine, fusilli, farfalle (bow ties), and the hollow or cupped shapes such as penne, maccheroni, ziti, rigatoni, bucatini, conchiglie (shells), lumache (snails).