Showing posts with label noodles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label noodles. Show all posts

October 6 - National Noodle Day

Posted October 6, 2020


You know what today is all about: oodles of noodles! We're talking noodles in restaurants and grocery stores as well as homemade noodles. We're talking noodles with sauce and noodles in soup, noodle salad and noodles and cheese.

Basically, we're talking yumm!


Did you know that the English word noodle comes from the German word nudel? The word for noodle in Italian may be familiar: spaghetto - But we are more used to the word pasta, which includes SO MANY shapes and sizes of noodles. There's also ramen, udon, pho, gnocchi, chow mein, laksa, egg noodles, saimin, kushari, macaroni, spätzle, pad Thai, and so many more ummy-yummy oodly-noodly kinds of noodles!

Just a sampling, of course...

Did you know that archeologists found in China well-preserved noodles that are 4 THOUSAND years old?

Did you know that noodles are made of LOTS of different foods, including potatoes, wheat flour, rice, beans, yams, and veggies such as squash and carrots and broccoli stems? 


To celebrate...well, you know what to do...or should I say EAT?

Here are a few of my favorite types of noodle-based dishes:








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October 17 – National Pasta Day

Posted October 17, 2018

There's nothing better than spaghetti with a nice marinara sauce.






Unless it's a thick, cheesy serving of lasagna.




Or maybe linguine carbonara?






Or macaroni and cheese?

Or - or - or - 



Let's face it, pasta is super delicious but also oh-so-varied!


Pasta is dough made of durum wheat and water; it can be extruded or stamped into a lot of different sizes and shapes. We commonly buy boxes or bags of dried pasta and then cook it in boiling water...And then we serve it with olive oil or butter or meat or cheese or tomato-based sauce or cream-based sauce or veggies or or or or...

Pasta can be served hot or cold. It can be the main dish (or entrée) of the meal, or it can appear in a salad, soup, or side dish. 

Cold pasta?

Mmm, I LOVE many different sorts
of cold pasta salads.
Mmm, ramen!
Generally, we call similar foods that are not part of Italian cuisine "noodles" - and noodles can be made from everything from common wheat (rather than durum semolina) to rice, and from kelp to zucchini!


Even mmmmmmier: spaetzle!

Pasta is usually savory - but not always. Some desserts are made with pasta!



Last point: We often think of pasta as Italian. Many different cultures serve dumplings, which are small, savory balls or pockets of dough that may be stuffed with yummy stuff and then boiled or fried or baked, or it may be balls cooked in a stew. Polish pierogies, Chinese wontons, and Jewish matzo balls are just a few examples of dumplings, but both ravioli and tortellini are considered pasta even though they are stuffed like dumplings.



Celebrate pasta in the best way possible: by eating it!

Other uses for pasta:

Little kids can have fun sorting it by shape and color, or practice hand-eye coordination by threading pasta tubes onto straws or chopsticks.



How about ye olde macaroni necklace?


Large-sized pasta such as manicotti can make great craft materials.




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October 25, 2012 - World Pasta Day

The word “pasta” refers to the noodles used in Italian cuisine, but of course these days, Italian food is eaten the world over. And noodles—pasta by other names—make an important part of many different cuisines. Whether its ramen or spatzle, pho or reshte, noodles are especially important in Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Filipino, German, and Vietnamese cooking.

But let's get back to Italian pasta:

What is pasta made of?

Unleavened dough (that means dough that does NOT have yeast or baking powder, and so do not rise and expand) made from wheat flour and water.

(Pasta can be made from other grains, or can use eggs rather than water. Also, some pasta is flavored and colored with spinach, say, or tomatoes.)

What shapes does pasta come in?

Such a variety! The long, skinny noodles (spaghetti, linguini, or vermicelli) are most common, but people make and eat shells, tubes, spirals, bow-ties, wheels, and wide ribbons like fettuccine or even wider noodles like the ruffle-edged lasagna.

Plus more.

How is pasta made?

Most pasta is made through extrusion. The dough is forced through a die with a hole designed for the shape desired, making a long, continuous noodle that is cut to the desired size by rotating blades. Take a look!

Celebrate World Pasta Day!

Go to the grocery store and really look at the pastas and other noodles available to you. (Hint: Check out the Asian foods section and the refrigerated section as well as the pasta section.)

Try a kind of pasta (or three or four!) that you've never eaten before.

Try a noodle dish from a cuisine you have never sampled before. I really love pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) and kaese spatzle (German macaroni and cheese).




Also on this date:







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