Matching pasta shapes to sauces

Have you ever wondered why pasta comes in so many shapes and sizes? Choosing a pasta shape that compliments the sauce you’ll be coating it with will greatly uplift your finished dish and this little article is about helping you do that. While there are so many pasta shapes out there that we don’t cover here, below we have a look at the shapes we commonly see here in the Maldives.

Skinny & long

Thin long shapes like spaghetti, angel hair and linguine are ideal with light sauces that will coat them evenly without weighting them down. Light olive oil sauces, light cream based sauces, and light seafood sauces, work well with this shape.

Flat & long

Flat and long noodles like fettuccine and tagliatelle are great with rich meat sauces and creamy sauces like alfredo. The flat shape enables the pasta to stand against real richness and as a general rule, the wider the noodle, the heavier the sauce.

Shell

Shell shaped pasta like conchiglie pair well with heavy cream or meat sauces. Their shape gives them a sturdier bite and they can hold different textures brought in from meats and veggies. The larger ones can be stuffed.

Tubes

Tube like pasta such as penne, rigatoni and elbow macaroni are versatile. They are great with thick and chunky meat sauces, rich cheese sauces and in baked pasta dishes.

Twists

Twists like fusilli and rotini work well with lighter and smoother sauces like pesto that can cling to the twists.