Commercial short-cut extruded pasta: Cooking quality and carbon footprint vs. water-to-pasta ratio

Abstract

Pasta cooking is an energy-intensive process. Its energy requirements might be significantly cut by reducing simultaneously the cooking water-to-dry pasta ratio (WPR) and effective power supplied during the so-called pasta cooking phase. In the case of cooked short-cut extruded pasta of the Penne rigate type, the textural (i.e., hardness at 40% and 98% compression, and resilience) and chemical (i.e., relative water uptake, degree of starch gelatinisation, and cooking loss) parameters were almost constant for WPR ranging from 3 to 10 L kg−1. When cooking one kg of short pasta with just 3 L of water under mild mixing the energy needs reduced by about two-thirds with respect to the conventional WPR value of 10 L kg−1. In this way, it would be possible to reduce the greenhouse gases emitted to sustain the current consumption of dry pasta by about 50%.

An empirical equation was also developed to predict a minimum WPR value assuring no agglomeration of any pasta type (short or long) by accounting for the external surface and empty volume of each pasta piece, and most probable water uptake by cooked pasta.