This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Business & Tech

World Pasta Day Inspires Local Pasta Maker

The holiday brings back pasta-filled memories for Mezzogiorno owner and chef.

Today is the fourth annual World Pasta Day celebration, which culminated with an international conference held in New York City by the National Pasta Association, the International Pasta Organization, and Oldways. This year’s convention was titled “Pasta Meals on Every Family Table” and focused on presenting updated nutritional information and research about pasta. The convention was attended by the world’s leading pasta manufacturers and featured cooking demonstrations on how to prepare healthy pasta recipes.  

Scotch Plains restauranteur Franscesco Sabetta does not need an annual event devoted to pasta; he celebrates pasta every single day and has devoted a good portion of his life to eating and cooking pasta. Patch sat down with the Mezzogiorno owner to learn about his personal pasta-making methods, tips for the home cook, and hear his inspiring, family pasta stories and memories from when he was growing up in Salerno, Italy.

“What makes great pasta is good ingredients and lots of passion,” said Sabetta, a great teddy bear of a man whose love and enthusiasm for food and people is contagious. “My memories go way back to my mother and grandmother and lots of the women in my family in Italy making home-made pasta.”

Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.

Sabetta opened Mezzogiorno a decade ago in order to do what he enjoys best: cooking authentic Italian food, singing and entertaining patrons with his rich, baritone vocals, and sharing a bit of Italian culture with Scotch Plains residents. Mezzogiorno’s menu features an impressive variety of Sabetta’s homemade pastas (cheese ravioli, porcini mushroom ravioli, lobster stuffed ravioli, fusilli, whole wheat pasta, fettucini, gnocchi, farfalle (bow tie), tripolini (a type of square spaghetti), provolone stuffed tortellini, prosciutto stuffed tortellini, and more, as well as a range of commercial pastas.

“The way we make pasta is, I think, the best way possible,” Sabetta said. “There is no better way. I just use semolina and eggs. Instead of flour (which makes it doughy), I use semolina which is a little hard to work with, but the end result is a pasta with better flavor and much better texture. We use semolina, eggs, and water, and lots of passion. I knead the pasta up to a certain point by hand, and then I use a machine with a motor to press the pasta. Semolina pasta would be very, very hard to work it completely by hand. That’s why the old-timers used flour or a mixture. Rolling pasta by hand is an art. You have to be an old Italian woman to do it. It has to be very thin. There are so many ways of making pasta, and every one will tell you their way is the best. But I think mine really is, and I think my mother would agree if she were still here with us.”

Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.

According to Sabetta, the kind of sauce you pair with pasta is just as important as the kind of pasta you use. The thickness and texture of the sauce adheres to pasta shapes differently, and both homemade and store-bought dried pastas offer unique elements to each dish.

“I combine homemade pastas mostly with meat sauces because I don’t like homemade pasta with fish sauces,” advised Sabetta. “The flavor of homemade pasta made with egg doesn’t marry well with fish, so I tend to make homemade pasta with the most essential, rustic, mountain-type sauce recipes. I use mushroom, ragu, meat sauces, and cheeses (sometimes gorgonzola or sweet parmigiana). I tend not to use fish.”

Sabetta learned the craft of pasta-making from his mother, who actually made pasta a bit differently because she didn’t have all the ingredients that are available to Sabetta now. Sabetta’s mother used whatever she had on hand, and he learned and adapted from her basic recipes.

“My favorite pasta memory is fusilli, but not the same kind as commercial fusilli,”  Sabetta said. “In Italy, fusilli is a cylinder of pasta which is wrapped around a very thin, metal item, and then it is shaped by hand and pulled off the iron utensil. It’s very time intensive. It takes a whole day to make a proper fusilli. It comes from a little town where my father was born: Felitto. I remember my mother would make the fusilli, and my brother, two sisters, and I would argue and question why she didn’t make ravioli. Some of us would like to eat fusilli and some of us wanted to eat ravioli, so my mother made fusilli with ravioli to stop the fighting. It was the best.”

Over the years, Sabetta has held a number of promotions in his restaurant, including an Italian dinner and movie night during which guests enjoyed a themed menu, an Italian film (with subtitles), and a full discussion after the movie. But regardless of what endeavors he undertakes, Sabetta always circles back to one thing at Mezzogiorno: pasta.

“I am a pasta man,” admits Sabetta. “I am a pasta and bread man. Those are the good things. Pasta is my favorite and my temptation. I totally cannot be away from pasta. After two or three days, I get depressed. I have to eat pasta in any way, shape, or form. I love both homemade and commercial pasta. It depends on what you’re making and the mood you’re in. Good commercial pasta is good for so many other recipes. The important thing to remember is that pasta takes time. Make sure you have passion, because if you don’t have passion, the pasta won’t come out good. You should also experiment and have fun. Homemade pasta takes so long to make it and so little time to eat it, but what a pleasure.”

--------------------------------------------------

Local establishments that serve homemade pasta:

Mezzogiorno Ristorante & Caffe

450 Park Avenue, Scotch Plains

(908) 490-1200

 

Florence Ravioli Company

1741 E 2nd St, Scotch Plains

(908) 322-7222

 

Snuffy’s Restaurant

250 Park Avenue, Scotch Plains

(908) 322-7726

“Pasta Night” every Wednesday from 5-9 pm

 

 

 

 

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?