a couple of things noodle-related:
- tallasiandude has been meditating on the nu ro mian of his youth, and thinking that the plain wheat shanghai-style noodles we've been using are good but not quite the same as what he remembers... so when we spied some egg-white noodles of about the same size and shape from the same maker, we grabbed them to see if perhaps they might fit the bill. And they did, and how. They are chewier and more substantial, with a bit more flavor even, and they are spectacular in the beefy broth. All subsequent Noodlefests and nu ro mian endeavors shall be using this improved noodle!
- We tried some brown rice rotini from Trader Joe's. We are occasionally seized by such insanity, in the blind hope that this time will be different from all the other times when non-durum pastas are just plain awful. And astoundingly, this time it wasn't so bad. A little bland, but generally quite acceptable. I would recommend cooking them a little bit more than you would a normal pasta, because when one rotini (rotino?) is just perfect, some of the others still have undercooked cores. When it's uniformly soft, you kind of don't notice that it's made of not-wheat when you're eating it with a robust tomato-meat sauce. I think the fact that it is made with brown rather than white rice gives it a bit more body, texture and flavor. If I was gluten-intolerant, I would be entirely pleased with this product as a suitable vehicle for delicious sauces.
So that makes a total of two non-standard pastas that are decent: TJ's brown rice rotini, and the whole wheat pasta from Big Y (Full Circle organic whole wheat pasta, apparently not the Big Y store brand, but that's the only place we've found it locally).
Posted by foodnerd at March 10, 2009 10:49 AM