Pasta (Dried)

When you're buying, flip the box over and look for "bronze cut" or "bronze die" on the label: that rougher, matte surface grabs sauce far better than the shiny extruded stuff, and it's usually only a dollar more. Match the shape to the sauce, long strands like spaghetti for smooth and oily sauces, tubes and shells like penne for chunky ones that need pockets to hide in. Dry pasta keeps about 2 years in the pantry and cooked leftovers hold 3–5 days in the fridge (toss them with a little olive oil so they don't fuse into a brick). De Cecco is my everyday brand: bronze cut, reliable 10-minute penne, and it never turns to mush.

Al dente pasta comes down to one habit: start tasting 1–2 minutes before the package time says it's done because the box always overshoots and the pasta keeps cooking after you drain it. Use a big pot at a hard rolling boil (4 quarts of water per pound) and salt it properly, about 1 tablespoon per pound of pasta, since that salted water is your only chance to season the noodle itself. Pro tip for if you're finishing the pasta with a sauce: before you drain, scoop out a cup of the starchy cooking water and reserve it. A splash of it in the pan turns a sauce that slides off into a sauce that clings. Also, if the pasta is finishing in a sauce, I pull it a full 2 minutes early and let it cook the rest of the way in the pan every single time.