When a passion project meets serious testing and a little bit of stubborn curiosity, delicious things happen. This article explores how a passionate podcaster-turned-pasta-inventor rethought the fundamentals of pasta design and why an eye for texture, sauce capture, and bite transforms ordinary meals into memorable moments of cooking, recipes, bon apetit. Expect practical tips, surprising hot takes on everyday eating, and a handful of recipes that invite experimentation.
Key takeaways
- Rethinking a staple food starts with clear priorities: sauce-holding, forkability, and mouthfeel.
- Small tweaks in shape and surface transform how sauce adheres and how the bite feels.
- Kitchen basics—an honest chef's knife, a sturdy cutting board, and a 12-inch cast iron skillet—make creative cooking easier and more fun.
Why invent a new pasta shape?
The idea was simple but ambitious: create a pasta that does something better than most existing shapes. The inventor started from a place many home cooks recognize—the limits of store-bought pasta options. Rather than accept the status quo, the process began with exhaustive tasting, isolating variables like ridge length, ruffle depth, and piece size.
The goal was practical: design a shape that grabs sauce, stays on the fork, and offers an interesting mouthfeel. It also had to be shelf stable and affordable so people across the country could try it. What followed was three years of testing, iterations, and unexpected obstacles—proof that good cooking, recipes, bon apetit work best when curiosity meets discipline.
Design decisions that matter
Three design priorities drove every decision:
- Sauceability — deep ruffles and ridges trap sauce and make every bite flavorful.
- Forkability — shapes that sit on a fork without sliding make eating less precarious and more pleasurable.
- Mouthfeel — structural elements change how a piece of pasta feels while chewing, adding contrast and satisfaction.
As a rule of thumb in creative cooking, recipes that solve more than one problem at a time will feel inevitable once you see them in action.
Meet the shapes: Cascatelli, Quattratini, and Vesuvio
Three shapes emerged from this deep-dive into pasta geometry. Each one makes a distinct promise to the diner.
- Cascatelli — Ruffled sides and a central trough let sauce cling and collect right where every forkful needs it. The name evokes the way the ruffles look like little waterfalls when held vertically.
- Quattratini — Inspired by a nearly lost regional shape, this form features a square-ish cross section with small tubes in the corners. Ridges were added to maximize sauce pickup. Expect bold, structural bites that feel mouth-filling in the best way.
- Vesuvio — A playful, knot-like piece that works well for chunkier sauces and offers a fun texture contrast.
Practical note on portions
Some of these shapes are denser per piece. A pound of Quattratini contains fewer individual pieces than elbow macaroni, so portion expectations may need adjustment. A single piece can deliver more starch and substance than its size suggests.
Sauce matters as much as shape
Great pasta is the product of a marriage between shape and sauce. If pasta were a canvas, the sauce is the painting. Choices like thickness, oil content, and whether water is added at the point of saucing all change the final experience.
Two practical tips: first, treat drained pasta like lettuce in a salad spinner—steam and excess water dilute sauce adhesion. Shake and let steam escape before saucing. Second, add starchy pasta water sparingly and finish cooking in the pan so the sauce and pasta marry, not dilute.
Try a few inventive pairings
Expanding the pasta playbook yields delightful results. Examples to try at home include:
- Garlicky cacio e pepe with the crunch-enhancing pop of chili crisp for contrast.
- Kimchi carbonara for a tangy, umami-forward twist on a classic creamy sauce.
- Pasta pizza: mix long pasta with raw beaten eggs, spread on a sheet pan, bake until golden, top like a pizza, and bake again for a crisp-bottomed, sliceable pasta pie.
Small experiments to level up everyday cooking
Beyond pasta, a few playful investigations into how people eat reveal easy wins for home cooks.
- Cheese on the bottom of a burger brings the dairy closer to the tongue and helps seal in juices.
- Tortilla chip technique changes chip performance: scoop chips used upside down act like tiny domes and can carry thick dips more reliably than flat triangles. Try plowing across the dip instead of stabbing straight down to avoid breakage.
- Corn on the cob can be cut off and eaten as slabs for a juicy, uniform bite that maximizes kernel count per forkful.
Kitchen essentials that make creativity stick
Testing countless tools over the years reveals three essentials everyone should own:
- One reliable chef's knife — a comfortable, easy-to-sharpen blade that becomes an extension of the hand.
- A midsize to large cutting board — at least 12 by 15 inches with a nonslip pad beneath.
- A 12-inch cast iron skillet — enough surface area for proper browning and evaporation; it will last a lifetime.
When life hands you lemons
Preserve them. Whole preserved lemons or a preserved lemon paste are kitchen superpowers. A spoonful brightens sauces, lifts grilled meats, and adds bracing complexity to dressings. This small ritual unlocks bold, layered flavors that elevate everyday meals and supports the spirit of cooking, recipes, bon apetit.
For anyone ready to play, a jar of preserved lemons is one of the best low-effort, high-impact pantry bets to keep on hand.
Where to go from here
Experiment with shape and sauce. Start by trying a ridged or ruffled pasta the next time a recipe calls for long noodles. Swap in chili crisp or preserved lemon into a standard sauce and notice how small changes expand what a weeknight meal can be.
Above all, the joy of cooking comes from curiosity: taste, tweak, test, and repeat. Every discovery—big or small—adds up to better meals and a lot more happy plates.
This article was created from the video How Dan Pashman Invented a New Pasta Shape (Cascatelli) | In The Test Kitchen with the help of AI.
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