Our All-Time Best Pasta Recipes

Cacio e Pepe

Cacio e pepe is the simplest of dishes, but achieving creamy, silky perfection took us years of attempts. We did it. And you will too.

By Rose HattabaughFebruary 12, 2024

Fettuccine Alfredo

In Rome, fettuccine alfredo is totally unlike gloopy American versions—silky-smooth, buttery, and light.

By Diane UngerJune 11, 2021

Rigatoni with Roman Broccoli Sauce

Romans use the leaves that grow around heads of broccoli to make a flavorful sauce for pasta. In the U.S., most of the leaves are stripped off before broccoli is sold. Our recipe instead uses the stems, which are equally flavorful and produce a silky

Charred Red Sauce Spaghetti (Spaghetti all’Assassina)

In Bari, Italy, spaghetti is crisped til partly blackened—creating intensely concentrated tomato flavor and lasagna-like texture. OR Charring spaghetti adds rich, concentrated flavor and crunchy-chewy bits akin to the edges of a lasagna.

By Rose HattabaughApril 4, 2023

Rigatoni alla Zozzona

This Roman mash-up of carbonara and Amatriciana is, as Claudia Rinaldi describes it, “a dirty mess of delicious stuff.”

By Courtney HillAugust 9, 2023

Pasta with “Fake” Sauce

In Italy, we learned about Tuscan sugo finto, or “fake sauce,” so called because the vegetables—onion, carrot and celery—are minced, then gently cooked in fat to the point where they resemble, in both appearance and texture, bits of long-simmered meat

By Rose HattabaughOctober 4, 2024

Ragù Bolognese

This recipe makes enough ragù for lasagna Bolognese with enough leftovers for another night's pasta dinner. We were taught how to make it at chef Alberto Bettini’s Michelin-starred Amerigo restaurant outside Bologna. Try to purchase pancetta in a larg

By Diane Unger & Courtney HillFebruary 10, 2020

Lasagna Bolognese

The perfect lasagna marries the silky, meaty richness of Bologna’s ragù with creamy besciamella.

By Diane UngerFebruary 10, 2020

Spaghetti with Lemon Pesto

This zesty, lightly perfumed lemon pesto is inspired by the world-famous lemons of Amalfi, Italy.

By Courtney HillDecember 14, 2020

Pasta with Pecorino-Zucchini Sauce and Basil

This velvety sauce of pureed zucchini comes from Italy’s Amalfi Coast, where we were served some of the most beautiful pasta dishes of our lives—elegantly simple, all about fresh ingredients.

By Rose HattabaughFebruary 1, 2023