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Serving linguini. What do you use?

Tony Lockhart said:
What I'm finding is that after the pasta has been combined with the sauce, it tends to want to stay as one blob. A fork isn't man enough.

Thanks for the suggestions, and for a change none have been expensive! I'll run them past the chancellor to ask her what I think.
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I think you've got a pasta cooking problem - it sounds like it's turning into a sticky dry mess before you get the sauce onto it, and there's no recovery once that's happened.

If I were you, i'd experiment, and the best place to start is to cook your pasta in lots of heavily salted water (and I mean lots of water, I can't stand to see a small pan with pasta cooking in it), and to drain it when you think it's almost ready - the extra minute of draining and adding the sauce gets it to the right bite. The salt and lots of water tends to stop the pasta getting starchy and sticky, which is unpleasant.

I don't like those spoons with fingers, I think they are naff although saying that there's one in the kitchen because the missus bought it (honest!). Also, rigatoni is almost always the right choice, and you won't get your clumping problem unless you've really lost the plot!

Cesare
 
Heretic! You cannot compare Rigatoni to Linguini!.

Rigatoni is tubed to hold certain sauces within and eating it is an entirely different dish to a oval solid designed for sauce to adhere to a lesser extent.

Anyway you cannot twirl your fork into Rigatoni!
 
Tony Lockhart said:
What I'm finding is that after the pasta has been combined with the sauce, it tends to want to stay as one blob. A fork isn't man enough.
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I say, when you've finally managed to get it onto a plate, you don't eat it with a knife and fork ... !?
 
I trust by this stage you have spent sufficient time laying the table. In case you find that a challenging job, here are some hints from my copy of Pellaprat’s ‘Modern French Culinary Art.’ (1960 edition, naturally.)

The main prerequisite when laying a table attractively is good taste. This applies particularly to the actual decorations, which, together with the silver, the glass and the porcelain create the scintillating symphony of colour and the changing effects of light and shade which alone lend perfection to the table.

The housewife frequently has difficulty in decorating the centre of the table. The old-fashioned epergne or table centre was usually made of wrought silver or silver-gilt, built up more or less artistically with ornaments and mirror effects. Such centre-pieces are now out of date. People have become less pretentious and usually decorate the centre of the table with flowers.
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Advice that has certainly hit home around here. The hospice shop at the local tip has been snowed under with unwanted wrought silver epergnes and is refusing to take any more.
 
JensenHealey said:
Heretic! You cannot compare Rigatoni to Linguini!.

Rigatoni is tubed to hold certain sauces within and eating it is an entirely different dish to a oval solid designed for sauce to adhere to a lesser extent.

Anyway you cannot twirl your fork into Rigatoni!
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Linguine, linguine, linguine. NOT "linguini." It is not that hard, is it?
 
lsinclair said:
I trust by this stage you have spent sufficient time laying the table. In case you find that a challenging job, here are some hints from my copy of Pellaprat’s ‘Modern French Culinary Art.’ (1960 edition, naturally.)



Advice that has certainly hit home around here. The hospice shop at the local tip has been snowed under with unwanted wrought silver epergnes and is refusing to take any more.
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Wot, no 4 foot tall swan made of ice?
 
PaulMB said:
By the way, it is LINGUINE, not "linguini." In italian "lingua" is tongue, and is feminine, the term "linguina" is diminutive and means a small tongue. Thus, one "Linguina" or many
"Linguine."

It should also be written on the packet!

Damned foreigners!
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Tranquillo, Paul, tranquillo. Va bene.
 
JensenHealey said:
Heretic! You cannot compare Rigatoni to Linguini!.

Rigatoni is tubed to hold certain sauces within and eating it is an entirely different dish to a oval solid designed for sauce to adhere to a lesser extent.

Anyway you cannot twirl your fork into Rigatoni!
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I'm quite aware of what different shapes of pasta look like. As I said, in the context of clumping pasta, rigatoni is a fine choice, get that to clump ;)

The thing is, i'm now wondering what to have for lunch - all this talk of linguine is making me fancy olive and garlic, but no parsely in the house...

Cesare
 
stevec67 said:
Tranquillo, Paul, tranquillo. Va bene.
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It is not just the Brits; the Americans, the Israelis also keep writing "Linguine" with the wrong spelling on their menus. (I've even seen "focaccia" transformed into "fukkaccia" would you believe!

But, as you say, one must be tolerant. It is not their fault they are foreigners.
 
JensenHealey said:
The trick here is to keep a tablespoon or two of the cooking water in the pasta as you add the sauce.
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Best just to use tongs to take the pasta straight out of the cooking water, hold up for a second or two to let most of the water drain back into the pan, and transfer directly to the plate. Oh, and to cook with plenty of salted water with a splash of olive oil, and to cook until al dente, not until soft.
 
Cav said:
The real Italian way is to put the pasta, suitably drained, in the sauce not "chuck sauce in"...
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This is true only for a sauce like pesto, which is diluted first with a couple of spoonfuls of hot water from the pasta cooking, and possibly a little additional oil to make a fairly fluid emulsion. The past is then dropped on top and everything is mixed up.

With a standard tomato sauce, usually the pasta goes into the serving bowl first and the sauce is poured on top. Only when a huge quantity is involved is some sauce put underneath as well.

Mind you, if everything is properly mixed up quickly it does not really matter.

To cook something like spaghetti "al dente," I've found that when you take an individual spaghetto out to taste it, when you bite through it and can still see there is still a tiny (TINY!) nucleus of uncooked pasta at the very centre, this is the time to throw it in the strainer. It goes on cooking for about 30 seconds.
 
Bob McC said:
Never, ever cook pasta with oil.

Just litres of water and lots of salt.
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If you have a pot that is too small for the amount of pasta, a splash of oil stops it sticking together. But if there is plenty of water there is no need.

How much salt depends on how salty you like it and how salty the sauce is.
 
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