A fine day during my B.Tech days, some 14 years back, I was watching a cooking show. It was an Indian show and the chef was cooking pasta.

Till then, I had only known macaroni/penne/fusili as the only pasta shapes. But in that particular episode, the chef was showing a highly artisanal pasta crafted in the shape of an adorable bow. I listened carefully to the name of this pasta.

Farfalle pronounced “fa-falei”

And it was love at first sight! The way the sauce clung to the intricately shaped pasta was beyond me! I vowed to show off my knowledge to my culinary-handicapped or rather pasta-handicapped friends and family. And since then, the vanity in me rose to the surface whenever there was a plate of macaroni/penne/fusilli around and it conveyed that these pasta shapes were nothing compared to the farfalle one in its regal glory! 

And then, when I joined my first job, the office get-togethers began. At one such gathering, I saw boiled farfalle pasta at a counter. I had to try this, the hungry vain demon inside me had to taste its deliciousness.

The first bit was straight out of heaven! I have enjoyed pasta before, but this one was exquisite! How such a complex shape could hold the sauce and delight my palate? 

I continued to prefer farfalle pasta whenever I went to a restaurant. Any other pasta shape was boring and not worth spending money and my tastebuds over.

Until I bought a packet of farfalle to prepare it at my home. 😉

Covid came and with it, my overspending on pasta and noodles began. A fine morning, while my mom was cooking noodles in her signature style, I decided to try my hand at farfalle. 

Back then, I had no idea that farfalle pasta need to be carefully boiled.

Before this incident, my pasta was undercooked majority of times. So I decided to be careful and cook the pasta till it was properly boiled in a form that is edible. I prepared my red sauce from scratch from tomatoes, added vegetables for that extra crunchy flavour, then added perfectly boiled farfalle and gave the whole ensemble a vigorous tossing with our desi stainless steel spatula.

You should never ever do that to the delicate farfalle.

The trick with farfalle is that you have to boil it till it is al-Dante and then let it cook in the sauce for say 10 minutes. Light tossing with a wooden or silicone spatula is recommended. Because the bow-tie loses its shape – the middle joint comes off in excess boiling making the farfalle flat. The pasta sometimes breaks in between to minute glossy pieces. And many a times, the the bow joint in the middle can remain uncooked and hence, doughy. 

After that, I was extremely careful while cooking farfalle and was able to produce better, albeit still not perfect versions of this type.

And after a while, I stopped buying this pasta because it seemed like a headache to prepare. 

Oh, how quickly young rash love fades! 🙃