Pasta de John Spottiswood

A staple of Italian cuisine, pasta is made with a dough that's kneaded and then fashioned into hundreds of different shapes and sizes. The tiniest shapes are often used in soups, long ribbons or strands with sauces, and tubes and fanciful shapes in casseroles and pasta salads. Some shapes are large enough to be stuffed and baked, and others, like ravioli, come already stuffed. Most pasta is made with semolina, a hard wheat flour, but some producers use corn, rice, spelt, and kamut. These alternative grains yield a mushier pasta, but they're a boon to people with wheat allergies.