Pasta recipes to suit all tastes

Find an ever growing collection of delicious Mediterranean pasta recipes. Pasta is a versatile food that allows you to prepare comfort and nutritious dishes.

Galets is a Catalan pasta for a special Christmas soup or stuffed pasta recipes

It is indeed inexpensive, straighforward, and easily adaptable to one, four or more guests, or even to a hungry party crowd. This is probably the reason why it is consumed in impressive profusion all over the world.

Italian pasta recipes are the best known by far, but other Mediterranean regions have also developed their own pasta recipes and different types of pasta. Burballes in Majorca, hilofta in Crete, fideus in Catalonia, orzo in Greece, manti in Turkey, couscous in Morocco -they are but a few of the hundreds of different names and shapes of Mediterranean pasta.

Since pasta was introduced in the Mediterranean region by the Arabs, we in the Catalan Countries have also created our own pasta shapes and pasta recipes. Pasta is also a Mediterranean food.

Some of the tempting pasta recipes that you will find in this website are macarrons or penne rigate- stuffed magnolias or galets, canelons farcits -our own version of canneloni- fideuada -a mouthwatering paella with noodles instead of rice- and a remarkable collection of recipes for fideus or short noodles, among many others.

Pasta can be a life saver, and a kitchen should never be without some packs of three or four different types of pasta. You, the home cook, will be then well equipped for preparing a delicious pasta recipe in half an hour if some friends happen to knock at your door unexpectedly at dinner time.

Is a pasta recipe always healthy?

Not so long ago rumor had it that pasta was fattening, and many people, particularly women, avoided pasta recipes afraid of putting on weight. Fortunately, it has been shown that balanced pasta recipes combined with other foods like vegetables are not fattening by itself.

More importantly, when properly cooked al dente, fine quality pasta of hard or durum wheat is a healthy energy-giving carb. This quality of fine pasta is what has made pasta recipes a favorite dish of physically active people.

Dried and fresh pasta

There are different types of pasta. You have dried pasta, fresh pasta, and homemade pasta available. You can buy dried pasta virtually everywhere, and you find fresh pasta in gourmet or specialty stores. And if you really love pasta, you can make your own fresh homemade pasta. The Balearic island of Eivissa, that you probably know as Ibiza, kept the longest the tradition of making fresh pasta at home.

Although making your own fresh pasta takes time and effort, luckily none of us have to knead the dough with our feet any more as in ancient times. For making pasta dough, now we have electric pasta machines capable of handling the hard durum wheat used for most high quality pasta.

White and whole grain pasta

On the other hand, we can choose between white pasta and whole grain pasta. In the Mediterranean region white pasta of durum wheat is more widespread and takes less time to cook than wholemeal pasta. Both are tasty and healthy, and choosing one over the other depends on available time and personal tastes. The best is to alternate between different types of pasta.