PREPARED FOOD FOCUS
Pasta Dishes from
Around the World
Take inspiration from Greece, Mexico and
Myanmar for noodle dishes with international flair.
BY JOANNA PRUESS
PHOTOS: MARK FERRI; FOOD STYLING: LESLIE ORLANDINI; PROP STYLING: FRAN MATALON-DEGNI
54 ❘ SPECIALTY FOOD MAGAZINE ❘ specialtyfood.com
Greek Pasta
Salad with Tzatziki
Dressing
•
Burmese
Coconut Sauce
Noodles
•
Mexican
Mac-and-Cheese
with Chorizo
NUTRITIONAL ANALYSIS: LAUREN BRAUN, NUTRITIONAL LIFESTYLE DESIGNS, MIAMI, FL
W
hile theories abound about pasta's origins—including from the early Greeks, Arabs,
Romans and Chinese—the global reach of this humble staple is indisputable. In America,
each successive wave of immigrants added noodle-based dishes to our cuisine. Italians
taught us about baked pastas such as lasagna. Eastern Europeans had their tasty nudeln and 19th
century Chinese cooks in San Francisco started eateries catering to miners and railroad workers that
blended their style of cooking with noodles into frontier fare.
By the 1970s, Americans of every ethnicity were attempting to make pasta from scratch. Today,
with high-quality pasta readily available, that manual labor is no longer a necessity. Gluten-free
varieties have expanded its reach further still.
Although pasta remains a beloved and reasonably priced ingredient, prepared foods customers
need fresh dishes to tempt them. Adding style can be as simple as altering a popular recipe with ethnic
ingredients, as the following do.