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Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

To me, this feels like part of a cooking change we'll remember in 20 years.

We were all taught to cook dry pasta in a giant pot full of boiling salted water, the more water the better. No! Not optimal!

A trivially simple change fundamentally alters the process for the better: soak the pasta in cold water for a couple hours (as far in advance as you like, for convenience). The pasta rehydrates and takes on the texture (but not flavor) of cooked pasta.

Cook it in any hot liquid, quickly (3-4 minutes). Done.

The Ideas In Food book (which is a-m-a-z-i-n-g and nerdy) plays around with this technique in a bunch of interesting ways. But they didn't manage to turn box pasta into ramen noodles. Turns out: not so difficult if you use the modern technique.

This article gets even cooler than making ramen at home. Read it! Strong recommend! Extremely hacker-y!

Also: Lucky Peach is pretty great.

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Honestly, I'm not sure that I get the value here. Is it just the ability to do some of the prep in advance? Why is (2hrs + 4min) better than (10min)? When I'm cooking a meal, getting the pasta done is rarely the limiting factor on any axis: it's dead simple, predictably timed, and requires very little attention beyond an occasional stir.

If you're looking for a different taste or texture and this is a way to achieve that, cool. But what makes the usual way "not optimal"? (I'm very leery of bold claims of revolutionary new cooking techniques based on traditional equipment and ingredients. People have been working to optimize cooking and discover new techniques for the entire history of civilization, and most of the low-hanging fruit has presumably been plucked long since.)

I'm with you, it's just not a big enough time saver to be worth it beyond the novelty IMHO. Also it's way easier to store some dried pasta vs. this hydrated pasta (that presumably has to take up some precious refrigerator space?).

Why would you store all your pasta rehydrated? That doesn't make any sense.

Yes. It moves and splits the prep, so that the longest part of it is doable far in advance. It removes a timing element from the the finishing of the dish, too; it user-proofs the pasta. Pasta timing is predictable, but requires actual attention to be paid to that timing.

It's particularly useful for risotto, or for dishes like baked mac & cheese where rehydration in boiling water will overcook the pasta.

What's particularly interesting about this technique is that it requires no equipment or advanced technique. Just soak the pasta in cold water. That's it. That's why I'm so effusive about it.

What? You've removed 4-6 minutes from the "longest part" (which is likely eaten up by setting up the soak, draining it, and washing the soaking container) and your technique still requires timing the pasta.

I will try using this technique next time I make carbonara.

Carbonara is simple: cook bacon, reserve grease, pour in hot pasta + cheese + milk + egg.

If I'm on the ball, I can cook and crumble the bacon a day in advance, but then the full pasta boil is easily the longest part of the process.

If I have the bacon already prepped and can reduce the "bring-to-boil + wait ten minutes", it's actually a very nice time savings for me when having a dinner party.

If you have a hot liquid to cook the pasta in, you don't need to bring-to-boil; you can heat rehydrated noodles through in oil, butter, bacon fat, or whatever.

Ok, that's interesting: I hadn't recognized that you could use the pre-soaked pasta directly in fat (without further boiling in water/broth/whatever). I'm now more intrigued; thanks!

Milk or cream were not in the original carbonara recipe.

BTW Carbonara is named after minced black pepper which should make it look like carbon - YMMV though. Oh, and don't forget to add grated pecorino cheese!

Dump noodles in bowl. Fill bowl with water. Walk away indefinitely. I don't care how much time that takes, because it's neither timed nor attended, unlike boiling pasta.

("Washing the soaking container?")

There's no real "timing" the pasta during cooking. "Heat noodles through". Done.

You should try it.

> There's no real "timing" the pasta during cooking. "Heat noodles through". Done.

You've still got to cook them if they're pre-soaked, and avoid both undercooking them and having tough noodles and overcooking them into a starchy sludge.

Either way, you'll either be going off a timer or by checking every few minutes for doneness. I don't find pressing a single button on my phone and saying "11 minute timer" to be so onerous that I'd look into soaking noodles hours in advance just to have to check them to make sure they're al dente anyways.

Yes... as a technique, possibly interesting, but it would actually increase the time taken to prepare my pasta dishes!

Restaurants can benefit from this knowledge. They have the down-time to prepare the noodles in advance, and can gain immensely by having shorter processes on the serving side.

>A trivially simple change fundamentally alters the process for the better: soak the pasta in cold water for a couple hours (as far in advance as you like, for convenience). The pasta rehydrates and takes on the texture (but not flavor) of cooked pasta.

>Cook it in any hot liquid, quickly (3-4 minutes). Done.

I was always told to presoak stuff like pasta while camping, as it cuts down on fuel use. I guess that's an unexpected side benefit to the above too.

(Not sure if it would be enough to make a noticeable difference in a domestic setting. But when you're running a small gas stove, every little helps.)

One thing I like doing with pasta: cook in minimal water like rice. Especially with something like orzo, I'll brown it in olive oil, then put in ~1qt of water/pound of orzo and cook till it's all absorbed. Maybe add a little salt and basil while cooking.

The kids just love it.

I'm friendly with a really awesome chef-turned-butcher in Chicago (Rob from Butcher and Larder) and when I posted this to my Facebook feed, he PM'd "while you're on your unconventional pasta cooking trip- get a small shape and cook it like risotto: sweat onion, garlic, etc. Add pasta and coat. Add wine and stir. Add stock cup by cup as per risotto."

Cooking pasta in minimal water is in the Ideas cookbook (again amazing buy strongest possible recommend).

To me, the huge shift is going to be decoupling rehydration from heating. It's more convenient, produces more consistent results, and opens up a lot of possibilities, like flavoring and alkalizing.

Got a link to the cookbook? I'd like to check it out.

Seems to be this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Ideas-Food-Great-Recipes-They/dp/03077...

Yep!

Yes, I did that recently with orzo. It was lovely, every bit as creamy and delightful as a risotto with arborio or other short-grain rice.

Do you think this would work with pearl couscous?

Have you tried this yet? How does the end result compare to forking over the extra $ for fresh pasta rather than dried?

Between this tip and the baking pasta one, my girlfriend is going to look at me very oddly next time I cook pasta.

> How does the end result compare to forking over the extra $ for fresh pasta rather than dried?

Actually making fresh pasta is pretty fun…

And very very messy.

It is a lot of fun, it tastes amazing and it gets quicker and less messy the more you do it.

Recently I decided I would start getting a lot more use out of an Imperia I bought years ago, with the specific goal of getting good/fast enough to not make a huge mess and be able to (literally) crank out a few helpings quick enough for dunner. Practice makes perfect...

The most time consuming part is mixing the flour and egg, and if you don't do it well enough you're going to have a hard time rolling and particularly cutting.

It turns out that it's a perfectly acceptable 'cheat' to just use a food processor... I tried it the last time and I ended up with a decent dough in a fraction of the time it takes to hand mix. That was an encouraging development :)

The ramen thing? No. Just found out about it.

Cold water rehydration? It's pretty much our default way of cooking pasta. I roasted it dry last night before rehydrating, until the pasta was a medley of different earth tones. First time I'd tried that. It was extremely cool.

> How does the end result compare to forking over the extra $ for fresh pasta rather than dried?

Why not just make your own fresh pasta, it's not that hard!

I have an attachment for my food mixer - so all I have to do is put my dry flour in the mixing bowl until the gluten is developed and then feed it through the pasta rollers.

$200 gets you a dedicated machine

http://www.pasta-recipes-made-easy.com/electric-pasta-machin...

or even cheaper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDImZ493V3U

Watch Gordon Ramsay do it by hand

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VzXH3o88mw

Because it's really messy, involves a lot of counter space, takes a fair amount of extra time, and isn't shelf stable.

Making your own pasta is a great idea. Also delicious. But it's like a Sunday afternoon idea.

Turning dried pasta into alkalized ramen-style noodles, though, is something you can set up in 4 minutes on a Tuesday night and then on Thursday when you remember you did that setup have for dinner in 3 minutes of cooking time.

The two cooking techniques just aren't comparable. The point of the Ideas In Food technique isn't to approximate fresh pasta. It's to make a better and more interesting use of dried pasta, which is simply a different product.

> [fresh pasta] isn't shelf stable.

You can freeze it.

I use something like this [1] to make pasta very often. Ok, making ravioli is something that takes at least 30 minutes (and up to 4 hours if you're making an elaborate recipe for a large party). But you can make tagliatelle for four in the time the water boils.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/CucinaPro-150-Imperia-Pasta-Machine/dp...

See definition of "shelf stable". :)

And you can cook without thawing it first :)

"Because it's really messy, involves a lot of counter space, takes a fair amount of extra time, and isn't shelf stable."

This. I have a pasta roller and some different cutters and I really enjoy the fruits of my labor when I do it. However, it's such a PITA that I rarely do it - it's so much easier to throw a box of dried pasta in some water I often just do that.

I suppose that's true of just about everything in cooking but I'd rather skimp here and spend my time making some other component super awesome.

Same here. I have a really lovely Italian-made hand-cranked roller that I've used to make fresh noodles for lasagna or cannelloni. You can't beat the flavor or the texture. And they cook up very quickly and are ready to go... once you've put the effort into making them.

...but, here's the kicker: I haven't touched it in years (and I mean years!). Premade noodles are far too convenient to pass up. And if I'm making a few other things at once, I often don't want to be bothered with fiddly stuff like making noodles (and the counter space is usually at a premium anyway). I love cooking, but I often don't have the patience I used to for some things. These days, I'd rather sink my time into making some really amazing breads or trying out new recipes.

I'll have to clean up that old roller. But gosh, the time investment sometimes makes me dread the thought. ;)

Don't waste your money on electric and get the $60 manual thing.

http://www.amazon.com/CucinaPro-150-Imperia-Pasta-Machine/dp...

A word of warning, though--that pasta roller will be nearly useless to you unless you have a very heavy table or countertops with a right-angle edge. If you have a rounded edge, you can't clamp it down properly, and won't be able to turn the crank.

When we use ours, it has to be clamped to a wooden TV-tray table, and I have to hold it down with my legs as I crank, because both hands are occupied with the pasta, and the table is too light to keep the work surface from bouncing around.

If you have no suitable surfaces in your home, get the freakin' electric roller.

Most people I know use a wood board to clamp it. These boards are usually made of untreated birch, beech or basswood and are available on the european amazons.

http://www.amazon.it/Kesper-2012-2-Spianatoia-pasta-68x48/dp...

http://www.amazon.it/Asse-pasta-betulla-100x60x1-E2011/dp/B0...

http://www.amazon.de/Nudelbrett-aus-Birkenholz-100-E2011/dp/...

http://www.amazon.fr/Planche-pâtes-bouleau-100x60x1-E2011/dp...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beechwood-counter-board-100x60x1-2-E...

> How does the end result compare to forking over the extra $ for fresh pasta rather than dried?

Fresh pasta is not better than dried pasta, just different. You can't get an al dente texture with fresh pasta, for example.

Are you sure about that? When I visited Italy, it seemed that pretty much all pasta was fresh pasta. You could find it in practically every store. Every restaurant served pasta that was fresh and eggy. I'm skeptical that a technique requiring dry pasta would be so widespread in a country that loves its fresh pasta so very much.

Also, my feeling is that the definition of "al dente" is a little nebulous. I've seen it used to mean "the end result should be slightly chewy", but I've also seen recipes where it means "don't cook the pasta all the way so that it can finish cooking in the sauce pan". I get the feeling that the latter is what's more common in Italy.

(But I could be totally wrong about all this!)

Going by etymology, I would guess it means the former, as "al dente" comes from "Of the tooth"

Some people just find al dente to be more pleasant for certain pasta shapes than the soft texture of fresh pasta.

Finishing the pasta in the sauce is always a good idea when it's possible, but you'd still aim for an al dente final texture (e.g. put it into the sauce when it's about a minute away from being al dente).

"Al dente" is the equivalent of rare, there's no ambiguity to it in Italian.

We mainly eat dried pasta; it could be that fresh pasta is overrepresented in restaurants, though.

When I was visiting, I was surprised by how many grocery stores stocked fresh pasta. You could find it almost anywhere. Now that I'm in Dublin, I can't even find a single one!

> Fresh pasta is not better than dried pasta, just different.

That's true in the trivial sense that "better" is subjective, so nothing is inherently better than anything else.

OTOH, plenty of people do find fresh pasta better than, and not merely different than, dried pasta.

> You can't get an al dente texture with fresh pasta, for example.

Untrue. Al dente texture can be achieved with fresh or dried hard-wheat pasta; you can't get it with soft-wheat pasta, and soft-wheat pasta is easier to work by hand, and is for that reason increasingly popular as fresh pasta -- but you can make fresh hard-wheat pasta, and it used to be more common than it is now among fresh pastas, and you absolutely can make such pasta al dente.

> That's true in the trivial sense that "better" is subjective, so nothing is inherently better than anything else.

That's not at all what I meant. Sometimes dried pasta works better than fresh pasta, and vice versa.

> you absolutely can make such pasta al dente

That's interesting. Does it have advantages over dried pasta?

Go to the Asian groceries for fresh noodles, they're cheaper than dried.

I don't think this article is about regular pasta (e.g. for use in Italian dishes), I think it's specifically meant for ramen noodles, hence the added baking soda to make the water alkaline. There isn't any real advantage in adding so much to your prep time otherwise.

Besides, if you're cooking Italian pasta just get the fresh stuff, it'll take 4 minutes to cook and it'll taste better anyway.

This article isn't, but the pasta section in the Ideas In Food cookbook is.

Ah. . . . gotcha. Yeah, all of the things I've seen on alkaline noodles are in relation to asian noodles. I'll have to give the pre-soak a shot sometime if I ever end up stuck with dry noodles. How much difference in flavor is there from fresh pasta?

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but you seem to think that fresh pasta is "normal pasta made fresh", therefore it's "better" -- but that's not true.

Fresh pasta is technically a dough; it's made with eggs. Dried pasta is made of durum wheat only. Fresh pasta tastes completely different and won't just work in any dish; works best for the more delicate dishes such as Alfredo.

Okay, perhaps? Not sure I've ever had a pasta that didn't taste better fresh. Can you name an example? I'm no expert but I'm not a complete noob either.

I don't think fresh pasta goes well with bolognese or ragu, for example. The composition of fresh pasta is much more delicate; it is softer, coarser and has less of a bite to it than dried pasta. Because it's so delicate and overcooks easily, it works best with minimal amounts of sauce that doesn't overwhelm or end up overcooking it.

My point is and was, it's simply a different product, much like egg noodles vs. rice noodles. One is not necessarily superior to the other.

A couple of relevant articles:

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/17/dining/italy-truth-about-p...

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2010/11/dont-fuss-...

Semolina is durum wheat (same stuff for dried and fresh), so I don't think there's a difference there. And I don't think I agree with regards to the flavor of a bolognese or ragu.

Then again, good fresh pasta is pretty easy to come by where I live (across the street from Raffetto's in NYC).

Anyway, thanks for the clarification. I don't think I really agree with you, but I'll make it a point to cook something with some high quality dried stuff and check the difference. Cheers!

> The composition of fresh pasta is much more delicate; it is softer, coarser and has less of a bite to it than dried pasta.

That can be true -- particularly, essentially all dried pasta is hard-wheat pasta, fresh pasta may or may not be hard-wheat pasta. But I don't think the distinction you draw is particularly true when comparing dried pasta with fresh pasta using similar wheat.

"soak the pasta in cold water for a couple hours"

What's new about that? Even my grandmother used this technique as long as I can remember. That also works with rice, buckwheat, green peas, beans or pretty much any grain and seeds that are highly dehydrated.

There's also the cold water in a frying pan for one serving of noodles method. Place cold water and noodles in frying pan. Set on high, stirring constantly. The noodles cook in ~10 mins.

Seems likely to lower the nutritional value unless you cook with the cold water.

What's the nutritional value of pasta? It's pretty much just carbohydrate. Cooking pasta, letting it cool, then re-heating it converts the starch to fibre. Maybe this technique does something similar? If so it's a good idea.

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