"spaghetti" news and stories

Happy National Spaghetti Day!

A dish tragically overlooked -- nay, coveted -- by dieters, spaghetti is the ultimate in simple comfort foods. With a nearly effortless execution (boil, top with your favorite pasta sauce, throw on a dash of cheese), the soul-warming dish is ready to be devoured in moments.

Here, Flickr user Sophiemostly lightens the dish by cutting in julienned slices of squash and adding fresh lemon, acts which perhaps alleviate some guilt to the resolved carb-conscious. Mario Batali's tomato sauce is our go-to staple, but we like to get adventurous sometimes too, getting creative with whatever fresh produce and herbs we find in our refrigerators.

What's your spaghetti secret? Share your suggestions in the comments!

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Everyone loves pasta. To satisfy your pasta cravings and find the best pasta, take this pasta shape identification quiz from Slashfood.

Slowly but surely, home cooks are coming 'round to the idea that many one-hit wonders of the gadget world just aren't worth the purchase. Heck, there are even some two-purpose gadgets that we could really do without. One such gadget would be a dried spaghetti measuring device. You know, something to tell you just how many noodles are needed for the amount of mouths you have to feed.

But what if it is not only pretty, but also offers another truly handy alternative that makes it a benefit to your kitchen?

The Noooodle, seen above, might be overrun with O's, but it's also a funky trivet that doubles as a spaghetti measuring device. What I particularly like about this is that it also looks quite nice -- the perfect trivet to use when you have company, and heck, it would even look nice hanging on the wall.

[via The Kitchn]

Yesterday, I set aside a few hours to make pasta, which was a bit of a mess when the eggs toppled over what I thought was a nicely built tube of flour. Once I got it all worked out and rolled out an assortment of pasta, I went about making a spaghetti dinner for myself. But even with a freshly made sauce and pasta, it sounded boring.

So, I set out on an inspiration hunt. A quick peek in the fridge revealed some cheese that I was still meaning to eat. Then I spotted a freshly washed french onion soup bowl in the cupboard. And then I spotted my small fry pan that had a little bit of lemon olive oil left over after frying up the sauce's mushrooms. Voila!*

The noodles got tossed in the oil, and then in some of the sauce, before being placed in the bowl. Then it was topped with another scoop of sauce, a suburst pattern of cheese, and some leftover fresh basil. I threw that in my toaster oven's broiler while I tossed up a salad, and in no time, I had a quick variation on the normal pasta. The cheese melted into a perfect, thorough covering, and the pasta had a nice citrus hint that worked well with the sauce. It was definitely worth the slight extra effort, and next time I might even go another step towards the french onion route and add some crispy garlic bread under the cheese.

*Edited

Biggie, the bento whiz over at Lunch in a Box, has a really cool tip on freezing individual portions of food for handy lunches.

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