Dry pasta VS Fresh pasta (home made as well as store bought)

Cooking Discussions Cooking, Cookbooks, Ingredients
1

I have had this post in my thoughts for a while

I think some elitists think that freshly home made pasta with semolina and 00 flour together in 1 to 3 parts will make the best freshly home made egg pasta and 100% semolina flour with the correct water ratio will make the best home made dry pasta.

Well after having made pasta at home for now 4 years and reading and watching all the best from the Italian top chefs, I can’t say that one is superior to the other.

In fact, I personally prefer the best dry pasta store bought to the über best professionally made and my own artisan home made version of dry pasta.

Even my home made dry pasta with pure high class yellow semolina flour made parra dried on a rack for 48 hours can’t give me the one thing, that production plant high class Italian dry pasta can give me. Which is real al Dente

AL DENTE
AL DENTE
AL DENTE
AL DENTE
AL DENTE

To the teeth.

Even my home made self made self dried on a rack for 48 hours parra made from the best quality semolina flour can’t replicate true al dente texture pasta.

That’s my problem.

This is why I prefer and use dry store bought pasta 8/10 times when I make my pasta dishes.

Don’t get me wrong. Home made fresh pasta is wonderful. For certain specific dishes. Fantastic.

But for certain specific pasta dishes like spaghetti carbonara and other pasta dishes, high quality dry pasta is clearly superior. SUPERIOR. let me repeat. SUPERIOR.

I have two favourite brands:

Monograno Felicetti & La Molisana

I’m going to post videos from Alex, a YouTuber who takes food to the next level.

He’s doing a series on dry pasta VS fresh home made pasta.

Incidentally Monograno Felicetti is the brand of dry pasta he follows and endorse in his videos.

No Shame in endorsing Monograno Felicetti.
It’s like endorsing Ferrari as the best car made in Italy. It arguably is.

More to follow.

Please share your honest and most sincere opinions

Let us not fight over this subject.
Let ur instead share our knowledge and let us all learn from different opinions.

This is only post numero uno.
Hope more posts will follow……

Cheers, Claus

By the way, people on Chowhound thought I was more about nerdy cookware than actual cooking and cooking technique discussions. I always said they were wrong.
I’m much more about actual cooking and cooking techniques. I just want the best available cookware to cook in. My stovetop is really awesome for what (little) it is.

First video from Alex.

Why is dry pasta so vital in Italian pasta dishes ?
AL DENTE
AL DENTE
AL DENTE

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2

That’s like say somebody prefers fresh duck legs over duck confit - both might start from the same ingredients but have very different end results and applications. Each of them has their place in different dishes - neither dry nor fresh pasta is “better” or “worse” - they both have their places in dishes

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Of course they have, but my personal opinion is, that pasta al dente is so vital a part about pasta, that it’s like husband & wife.

You can live happily alone your entire life, but the natural thing is to stay together like pasta and al dente.

What gives most Italian pasta dishes the uniqueness is al dente of the pasta.

Of course that’s my opinion.

YMMV

4

The desired consistency of pasta depends on the dish. For certain ragus for examples I prefer fresh pastas with a slightly softer consistency whereas a kale pesto will work better with dry pasta and more al dente consistency

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5

Dry Pasta in alphabetical yet no preferential particular order:

Barilla
De Cecco
Divella
Delverde
Favuzzi
Pirro
Rummo
Rustichella d’abruzzo

It really comes down to which Italian Shop I’m close to or am I shopping at a Grocery Store/Supermarket.

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6

I’m not saying fresh pasta is horrible.
I love fresh pasta.

I just prefer dry pasta in 8/10 pasta dishes.

This is not about right or wrong.
It’s about personal taste experience.

Your taste is as right as mine.

But the thing you can’t argue about is old traditional Italian pasta recipes.

And AL DENTE pasta is a vital part in most Italian pasta dishes and you can’t beat the AL DENTE taste impression you get from high quality dried pasta over dried fresh pasta in my view.

That’s just my opinion of course.

And Italian pasta master chef Luciano Monosilio opinion too.
The only chef in the world to make his own true dried pasta at his own restaurant in Rome.

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7

Of course it’s all YMMV

But in 8/10 Italian pasta dishes, the recipe calls for a dry pasta with AL DENTE mouth feel.

You can’t replicate true AL DENTE pasta from even 48 hours dried on a rack fresh pasta. Just not possible.

8

Basic pasta recipes from the Italian pasta master chef Luciano Monosilio

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Why you can’t replicate dry pasta at home.

It’s just not possible.

Video from Alex

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The best dry pasta to buy:

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I prefer dried pasta to fresh . Absolutely al dente. The most important part of the cooking to me . Tossing the pasta into the pan with a small amount of sauce or whatever your condiment is . Some pasta cooking water from the pot . Now toss the pasta in the pan , toss ,toss , toss until done . I like the condiments to adhere to the pasta.

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12

You’re my pasta brother from another mother.

Your pasta technique sounds almost 110% identical to mine.

You can’t do this with a fresh pasta.

To me - in too many dishes - fresh pasta seems bland. (Even the high quality Semolina 33%/66% 00 flour egg pasta)

You can’t speed sauté (FINISH as some call it) fresh pasta the same way you can with boiled dry pasta yet still obtain the AL DENTE mouth feel.

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13

Nothing dry beats fresh fettuccine.

14

Piano , piano , piano . Cin Cin🍷

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15

Why dry pasta is the only pasta for Spaghetti carbonara and what’s speed sautéing pasta all about ?

16

It’s your opinion and your perfectly entitled to it, but where’s the AL DENTE in your fresh fettuccine ?

If Fettuccine is not AL DENTE, I’m not eating it.

17

Indeed. You asked for it.

I only made enough for me. :smirk:

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18

Tremendously interesting. I’m not at all sure that i want al dente pasta in Marcella Hazan’s lasagna or in her Begger’s Purses or in classic Hankerchief pasta, or show stopping spinach and riccota spirals.. Just to note that there are different pastas that require starting with fresh sheets and result in other than al dente.

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19

Absolutely. Sheet pasta I don’t like al dente. Lasagna I prefer super thin fresh pasta . The best one I ever made was a recipe from sauver . It was so many years ago . Might have had spinach in it . So delicious. There were so many layers. But only ended up to be maybe a inch thick

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20

I like fresh pasta in ravioli, tortellini and gnocchi.
The shelf stable gnocchi is just disgusting.

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