There's no two ways about it: Italian food has a lot of rules. However, some of those rules are made to be broken, just like this extra-long pasta from Italy.
It's hard to visualize just how long our extra-large Giadzy Pasta shapes are without a frame of reference. At 22 inches in length, they're almost as long as two foot-long sandwiches laid end-to-end, or four dollar bills lined up in a row. That's more than twice as long as a standard noodle!
That supersized span isn't just a flight of fancy, but a reminder of the early days of pasta manufacturing in Italy. Before it was easy to cut pasta into smaller shapes with bronze dies and the machinery available today, local pasta makers would dry their pastas in much longer forms and hand them to dry over dowels or even clotheslines! It was up to each customer to break them by hand to their desired length, usually to fit into whatever pot they were cooking in.
For Giada, whose Nonno Dino's family made and sold pasta in the town of Torre Anunziata outside Naples, these long pasta shapes are an important connection to her family history. Upon seeing the extra-long pastas, Raffy was transported back to childhood. "I remember as a little girl, breaking the pasta by hand," she said, while snapping the pasta into pieces with Jade. With every crack of the pasta, Giada noted, "That's the noise you would hear coming from all the houses on a Sunday!"
When it came time for Giada and the Giadzy team to design our first set of Giadzy Pasta shapes to be produced by our partner artisans in Abruzzo, we knew these lunghi pastas had to be included. We started with manfredi lunghi and bucatini lunghi, which actually arrives just as it's air-dried in the factory, looped over on itself to show the handmade process we cherish today.
These extra-long pastas are a delight to receive as a gift, and it's always surprising (in a good way!) how huge the package is. When it comes to cooking this pasta, make sure you have a nice large pot available (at least 6 to 8 quarts!) and break it up into your desired length. You can break the pasta up into 3-inch pieces, 4, 5... or even leave it as long as you can!
Pair these pastas with simple, flavorful sauces - think marinara, cacio e pepe, pesto and beyond. The pasta is the star, so keep it simple.
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