Boiled Pasta

A pasta recipe that will help you make pasta al dente every time. The perfect base for a healthy meal. Serve with meat or vegetable sauce and a side salad.

• Ingredients
• Method
• Nutritional Content

Ingredients:

Number of servings: 2

• 200 grams of pasta of your choice
• 2 litres of boiling water
• A pinch of salt

 
Preparation time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Difficulty rating: Easy
 

Method

1. Heat the water in a large, covered pot until it is boiling rapidly;
2. Add the salt and pasta and stir immediately to ensure the pasta doesn’t stick together;
3. Keep the pasta boiling rapidly. You may need to adjust the temperature to ensure the water does not boil over;
4. Cook the pasta for about 10 minutes. Cooking times vary depending on the type of pasta. Use the instructions on the packet as a guide;
5. About a minute before the end of the recommended cooking time, taste a piece to see if it is ready. It should be soft but still firm. When you bite through the colour should be uniform. A white line in the centre of the pasta shows it needs further cooking;
6. When the pasta tastes ready, pour into a colander to drain and shake of the water;
7. If you are serving it hot with sauce, do not drain the pasta. Leaving a bit of the starchy water will help the pasta and sauce to stick. Pour sauce over the pasta immediately;
8. If you are using the pasta for salad, rinse it briefly with water to remove the starch.

 
Tips:

• Choose a whole grain variety of pasta. Whole grain pasta has fewer calories and more fibre than pasta made from white flour. Fibre is an important micronutrient used by the gastrointestinal system to digest food;
• Add a healthy sauce, such as vegetable pasta sauce and grated cheese for a tasty, calcium rich meal. Calcium is an important micronutrient for healthy teeth and bones which is found mainly in dairy products. Some people have increased calcium requirements including:
  • Pregnant women in the second or third trimester;
  • Breastfeeding women;
  • Adolescent girls or a mature women;
• Serve with a green salad for extra vitamins and minerals to keep your body healthy;
• Use gluten free pasta if cooking for someone with coeliac disease.

 

Nutritional content:

Nutritional analysis per serve:

Energy	1474 kJ 352.29 cal
Protein	11.2 g
Total fat	1.7 g
Saturated fat	0.30g
Carbohydrates	70.3 g
Total sugars	0 g
Fibre	3.2 g
Sodium	5 mg
Cholesterol	0 mg
Potassium	139 mg

More Information

For more information on nutrition, including information on types and composition of food, nutrition and people, conditions related to nutrition, and diets and recipes, as well as some useful videos and tools, see Nutrition.