The Pasta of Great Virtue

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. But there was an incident a long time ago that elevated Saveur Magazine to the position of one of my favorite food magazines.

One of the two pillars of the category, I can’t recall if it was Bon Appetit or Gourmet had a poll in which readers were asked about their favorite and least favorite wines. Well, by an order of magnitude, Chablis was the big loser.

A few months later Saveur ran a cover story on Chablis.

Perhaps the Saveur story was coincidental. But I loved that this small upstart magazine was challenging food lovers to think about a wine dismissed by many as cheap plonk. The truth is that real Chablis has always been great. It is just that cheap American jug wine producers have done an amazingly effective job at besmirching the reputation of a sub-region within Burgundy, by slapping its name on their vile hooch.

But today isn’t about wine. It’s about pasta. Now prepare to be challenged.

Incidentally, this post is only being written because –R commented yesterday in regards to the disconnect between my posts about food and what foods make up the staples of my diet. He wrote, “I realize writing about these topics makes for more captivating reading, since honestly, who really wants to hear about whole-grain toast, or yogurt.”

-R admittedly hasn’t delved that deep into the archive. And I can’t blame him. It’s up to almost 800 posts, if you can believe it. But I’ve written multiple posts on yogurt, and at least one on whole grain toast.

Still the sentiment of the comment isn’t lost on me.

Now try not to wrinkle up your nose when you read the next few words. Okay? Just try. Here it is:
100% whole grain pasta.

Pasta is one of those foods that’s a real treat. All those tasty and tender refined grains are delicious. Handmade or factory-made, fresh or dried, each brings its own set of strengths and weaknesses, and I promise to address these matters in the weeks to come. But I haven’t found anyone who is touting the nutritional value of conventional pasta.

We go through a lot of the stuff, although several years ago we made the switch to whole grain. Let me tell you now, all whole grain pasta is not created equal.

Some brands are truly awful.

At their worst whole grain pastas are gritty, and no amount of cooking will soften up their coarse texture that seems to include whole hulls from the wheat. But the best ones are smooth and tender. The 100% whole grain versions will never be quite as light as conventional pasta, but tossed with a hearty sauce, you could easily forget you are eating something so virtuous.

Sadly, the best version I’ve had to date is unavailable in the Capital Region.

The Trader Joes organic 100% whole wheat pasta is fantastic. Well, the spaghetti and fusilli are. The penne are a bit too thick and as a result suffer from some telltale coarseness.

Locally, the best I’ve encountered comes from Walmart of all places. This isn’t about it being the best value. This is the best texture for a 100% whole wheat dried factory made pasta I’ve found. My favorite is their linguini, although the spaghetti and rotini are also very good. The thin spaghetti is prone to falling apart, so those along with the penne should be avoided.

Each of them has just one ingredient: durum whole wheat.

Now here is a confession. I have a completely misguided belief that the more I eat of these products the healthier my digestive tract becomes. One 56g (dry weight) serving contains 210 calories, 7g of protein and a whopping 5g of dietary fiber. It’s the fiber that really helps clean out your system.

Although they say whole grains are good for a whole host of other medical issues. All I know is that they are the health food du jour. And that means you have to be careful about marketers leveraging the language in order to get you to buy inferior products. The words to look for are, “100% whole grain” instead of the vastly inferior, “Made with whole grain” or the even inferior still, “Now with fiber.”

In theory if you ate a half-pound (dry weight) of 100% whole grain pasta, even without sauce, you would be consuming over 800 calories. But this stuff is more filling than its conventional cousin, which makes such a feat implausible. However, should you be able to finish this extra large portion, you would be rewarded with 20g of dietary fiber. Many people don’t get that much in one day, let alone one meal.

It may be a bit jarring on your body at first, but remember, regularity is healthy too.

So put aside your prejudice about Walmart for 15 minutes, and buy one box of their pasta. The dollar you spend on these noodles isn’t going to oppress anybody. Once you discover how good it tastes, and how good it is for you too, then you can agonize over the decision on whether buying it again makes you a bad person.

Or you could just drive in your car two hours, each way, to the nearest Trader Joe’s. But that is not without its ethical consequences either.