There Are A Few Old Traditions Worth Hanging On To
There are two keys to serving authentic Italian pasta, and I'll get to them in a minute. But first, there are some basic pasta cooking rules that you've probably seen repeated over and over. However, because I am, indeed, a fussy, rule-bound old prig, I'm going to repeat them yet again.
Prima regola, don't break the pasta. Go ahead, I'm braced for it. “What difference does it make? It all tastes the same anyway. It fits better in my pot when I break it. It's easier to eat when it's broken up.” Does that about cover it? Good. Now, the explanation. Long pasta is long just because it's supposed to be long. It's part of the aesthetic of the dish and part of the cultural experience and tradition of making it and eating it. Some say that breaking long pasta is an insult to the skill and the craft of the pasta maker. Since most of what you buy in the store these days is machine made, I don't know how insulted the machines might be, but why take the chance? Bottom line? It's an Italian thing. Some rules are immutable and “don't break the pasta” is one of them. Or break it if you want. After all, you're gonna tell me it's your “right,” and it is. But it's not authentic and authenticity is what we're talking about here.
Secondo, salt the water. The only time you really get to enhance the flavor of pasta is in the cooking process. The pasta literally opens up during cooking to release starches and to take on flavor. After it's done, you can pour all the salt in the world on it and it's just gonna taste like salty noodles. Generous amounts of salt added to the water – about a tablespoon per quart – while the pasta is cooking is the only means of imparting proper seasoning to the finished dish. And save a little of the cooking water to help develop your sauce. The starchy, salty water acts as a flavoring and thickening agent that aids in the ability of the sauce to cling to the pasta as it enhances the overall taste of the finished dish. And you obviously don't want to rinse your pasta. You need some of that starch.
And while we're sort of on the topic, I'd like to find the old wife behind the old wives' tale about putting oil in the water to keep the pasta from sticking. Chemistry 101 says oil and water don't mix. All you're going to get is oily water.
Ultima regola, don't cook the pasta to mush. Al dente is the key. It should be a little firm “to the tooth” when you bite into it. If you want to overcook your pasta until it looks and tastes like something out of a Chef Boyardee can, go for it! It's your right. But it's not authentic.
And now that brings us to the first of those two keys to the authentic Italian way of serving pasta.
I'm old but I'm not old enough to remember how Americans ever came up with the notion of piling a heap of cooked spaghetti on a plate and then dumping a quart of sauce on top of it. But there it is; the typical American way of serving “spaghetti.” I guess it goes back to the early days of the Italian diaspora when everything Italian was still considered mysterious and exotic. Nobody outside the Italian enclaves knew how to cook the stuff, so they just punted. And that's what they came up with.
Now, I can give a little leeway to home cooks because, as I've acknowledged, you can do whatever you want with your food at home. It's the so-called “Italian” restaurants that really gripe me. If you run a place called “Vincenzo's” or “Giuseppe's” or “Lorenzo's” or “Giovanni's” and you serve pasta this despicable way, you should be stripped of your Italian heritage and the final vowel in your last name and you should just call your place “Vincent's” or “Joe's” or “Larry's” or “John's Place.” Because what you're doing ain't Italian and your mamma didn't teach you that way.
And I hear it all the time from Italian restaurant owners: “But that's what my American customers expect!” And I know. I can feel your pain. I once took over running a little American diner for a friend. And he offered a “spaghetti special” on Fridays, which I immediately remade in the authentic Italian way. For the most part, it was a great success, with patrons gushing with praise for the improved quality. Many said it was better than the Italian place down the street. BUT.....and there's always a “butt”.....I had one disgruntled dude who complained that what I put on his plate looked like “leftovers” because everything was “all mixed together.” He demanded his pile of plain spaghetti topped with a quart of sauce. I tried to patiently explain why I fixed it the way I did, but he wasn't satisfied and I never saw him again. He probably went to the “Italian” place down the street.
Anyway, in real, authentic Italian cooking, you always finish the pasta in the sauce. You never, EVER pile plain pasta on a plate and cover it with sauce. And if you're eating at an “Italian” place that does that, I'm telling you that they are just pandering to the lowest common denominator. Don't let 'em do it! Send it back and tell 'em, “Non insultarmi, stupido! Cucinalo come farebbe tua mamma!” Well, don't say it like that or you'll probably get thrown out. But you get the idea. Don't accept mediocrity.
There's a good reason we cook it the way we do. When you take the pasta out of the water a minute or two before it reaches that perfect al dente stage and let it finish cooking for those last couple of minutes in that delicious, flavorful sauce, the flavors – i sapori – of the pasta and the sauce will marry and mingle in a way that is simply not possible to achieve by dumping them on a plate separately. The pasta has already released its starches and opened up to absorb the salt you've added to the water and now it's going to further accept all the nuances of that full, rich sauce. É semplicemente il migliore! It is the considered opinion of anybody with even a drop of Italian blood in their veins that there is nothing worse than a pile of bland, flavorless spaghetti sitting and cooling helplessly on a plate while somebody drowns it in some thin, unremarkable sauce. And yet, that is the typical American standard “spaghetti dinner” preparation and Italians will weep for you.
Yeah, so I'm a little dramatic.
The other key to serving pasta the authentic Italian way is to leave it the hell alone!
In the scheme of Italian dining, pasta is a course in and of itself! You don't put anything “in” or “with” pasta. I can't tell you how many times I've been asked, “Would you like some chicken in that pasta, sir?” No, I don't want any frickin' chicken in my pasta! Chicken belongs to the next course, the secondo. This is the primo course and it's fine just the way it is. If you get nothing else out of this rant, get this, please: There is NOTHING wrong with eating a plain, unadorned, unadulterated dish of pasta and sauce.
In the traditional Italian meal structure, pasta dishes are paired with sauces that complement and enhance the overall flavor of the dish. Each ingredient plays its part in achieving a balanced outcome. Throwing chunks of chicken in there – or any meat or fish, really – throws that perfect balance out of whack. Those meats are considered secondary complements to the pasta, hence the term secondo. You serve them by themselves, or maybe in conjunction with the contorno, or vegetable, course, after, but never mixed in with, the pasta course. That's why you'll never find something like chicken Alfredo on an authentic Italian menu. Well.....you'll never find anything Alfredo on an authentic Italian menu, but that's another story. No “chicken tortellini,” no “chicken carbonara.” And Olive Garden's “Tour of Italy” is a visit to a place that simply doesn't exist. “A trio of Chicken Parmigiana, Lasagna Classico, and Fettuccine Alfredo on one plate!” There's so much wrong with that picture that I scarcely know where to start.
Putting aside the actual non-existence of chicken parm, you'll never find a “side” of pasta on a plate next to anything. Pasta is pasta and chicken is chicken. They don't belong together on the same plate. Neither does steak or pork chops or salmon. You don't mix meat with pasta and you don't serve pasta “next to” meat. That doesn't mean that meat can't be an ingredient in a pasta dish, like the pancetta or guanciale in a carbonara, but you wouldn't just slap a hunk of ham on a plate of pasta. Same goes for beef, pork, or veal in a Bolognese or in a ragu served mixed with pasta. But you don't, for instance, put hunks of meat – lookin' at you, meatballs – on top of a plate of spaghetti. And, while you might find some broccoli florets perched on a plate next to your 8-ounce sirloin, you'll never see a “side” of spaghetti there. At least you won't in madre Italia.
Okay, pluck the chickens and warm up the tar. I'm ready for the onslaught of commentary about how Italians are nothing but stuffy, pedantic, ultra-purist, hyper-critical pettifoggers and how food is food and you can fix it any way you damn well please. É vero! And you can wear white after Labor Day, wear socks with your sandals, and drive twenty miles an hour over the speed limit, too. Ain't freedom grand? All I'm sayin' is that authenticity usually comes with rules and that Italian culinary customs have developed over many generations. And that maybe, in this ever-changing world in which we live, there are a few old traditions worth hanging on to.
