I have the magic trick for restaurant-worthy pasta up my sleeve! It’s the pasta water, which is a blessing for every pasta sauce. If you simply let it disappear down the drain, you’re wasting its valuable potential. So here are some brief instructions on how to use pasta water for sauce.
What does pasta water do to sauce
During cooking, the salt water in which you cook your noodles absorbs the starch from the noodles. Starch is a natural thickener found in noodles, potatoes (check out this post about potato water), and rice, among other things. Perhaps you have already dissolved a mixture of starch in water to bind sauces and cake fillings and give them more structure. Or maybe you have observed the natural effect of starch in a creamy potato soup, which becomes even smoother as the potatoes break down in it.
When you add pasta water to your sauce, the same principles apply: the starch thickens the consistency when it boils and is heated, and helps everything stay together and form a homogeneous (and certainly not watery) sauce. It doesn’t matter if it’s a chunky ragù, a silky carbonara, or your favorite pasta from the pantry.
To make it a habit to keep the pasta water, you can catch some of it with a large cup before draining the noodles (that’s how I always do it), or scoop it into a heat-resistant jug. Then you can use it as needed to create the sauce of your dreams. Don’t forget to heat the sauce and the pasta water, let them boil and reduce a bit, so that the starch can do its work.
Starch water is also an excellent alternative to flour when cooking gluten-free dishes, as well as vegan recipes that require binding agents like eggs but don’t have any available on hand.
How to make butter sauce with pasta water
Pasta al Limone is a quick Italian classic that jazzes up simple pantry ingredients with refreshing lemon and a little parsley. The key to this dish, to balance out the acidity of the lemon, is a creamy sauce (but without cream!). To make it, you start by heating up some olive oil and butter (about 25 ml from each), deglazing the pan with 300 ml starchy pasta water and letting it simmer steadily until it starts to boil. Add any other desired ingredients such as garlic or herbs for extra flavor if desired – these are totally optional though, so feel free to skip this step if preferred too. Add more pasta water as needed to achieve the desired consistency.
Next, you add the al dente cooked pasta and toss it well for about 2 minutes until it thickens and becomes glossy. The starch in the sauce cannot resist the starch on the surface of the noodles, leading to a wonderful marriage of sauce and pasta. And all of this with a bright, festive-fresh shine.
How to use pasta water for thickening gravy sauce
Using the starch from the cooked pasta in your gravies can give them a rich, creamy texture that’s hard to beat. All you need is some cooked spaghetti or other long-strand noodles and a few tablespoons of their cooking liquid added into your gravy recipe as it simmers away on the stove top. The starch will thicken up any sauce quickly without having to add extra fat like butter or cream, which can be too heavy for certain dishes such as light fish recipes.
To make sure you get all of its benefits, don’t discard all of that starchy goodness after draining off the boiling water! Instead, reserve about ¼ cup (60 ml) before straining out what’s left over in order not waste anything valuable flavor wise – this amount should work well depending upon how much liquid there was originally used when preparing it earlier on prior to adding extras later down during preparations stage itself. Just remember: start small if unsure since adding too much may lead to result clumpy mess instead of desired outcome intended, so adjust accordingly until right consistency achieved desired end result obtained.
Can you use spaghetti water for soup
Using pasta water in soups is one of those classic cooking hacks that has been around since time immemorial. Not only does it add body and texture to any dish, but it also brings out all sorts of amazing flavors from whatever ingredients are being cooked. Plus, it helps thicken sauces without having to use additional starches like flour or cornstarch – which means less mess for cleanup afterwards!
Check out these other brilliant uses for leftover spaghetti water in this post! Or learn here how to use it for watering plants.