While legend has it that Marco Polo brought the recipe for spaghetti back from China, prior evidence showed that pasta has been made in Italy at least since the 4th century BC. In October 2005, a bowl of noodles 4000 years old was unearthed in a Chinese archaeological site as reported by the BBC.
Preparation
Most spaghetti sold and consumed is commercially prepared, then dried. Spaghetti is cooked by boiling the pasta in salted water until soft. The consistency or texture of spaghetti changes as it is cooked. The most popular consistency is al dente which is translated from the Italian as "to the tooth"; that is soft but with texture, sometimes even with bite in the centre. Others prefer their spaghetti fully cooked, which gives it a much softer consistency. The best dried spaghetti is made from durum wheat semolina. Fresh spaghetti should be prepared with grade '00' flour. Inferior spaghetti is often found produced with other kinds of flour, especially outside Italy.
An emblem of Italian cuisine, spaghetti is frequently served in tomato sauce, which may contain various herbs (especially oregano and basil), olive oil, meat, or vegetables. Other toppings include any of several hard cheeses, such as Pecorino Romano, Parmesan or Asiago. Outside Italy it is often served with meatballs, although that is not a typical Italian recipe.
Eating
According to Neapolitan habit, eating spaghetti with a fork and a spoon is perfectly polite, though the view on this varies in other cultures. Many other Italians eat it with just a fork like most other Continental dishes.
In Asia, many people use chopsticks as a form of eating rather than forks, as chopsticks are custom in most Asian countries.
In parts of the US, a narrow size of macaroni is sold as elbow spaghetti. This is a misnomer, as this product is short and tubular, thus it's not a spaghetti at all.
Spaghettini is a form of pasta that is very much like spaghetti, except a bit thinner. |
