Today, during a meeting at work, one of my colleagues decided to share a top culinary tip with us. She’s a pretty smart cookie, so I was curious to know what mind blowing gastronomic trickery she was about to impart.
She smiled, opened her mouth and said:
“The best way to tell if your pasta is cooked properly is to throw it against the fridge and if it sticks, it’s cooked.”
Illogical
After a long pause and a few shared looks of concern for both her mental health and the quality of her spaghetti bolognese, I replied, “Or, you could, y’know, taste it”.
After a few nods of agreement at my introduction of sanity, and some repressed chuckles at the ludicrous nature of what she’d just spouted out of her mouth hole, she sat up in her chair and became very animated.
“I’m serious! It’s the best way to test if your pasta is cooked!”, she insisted.
She was wrong, of course.
“Ask anyone!”, she continued, “Google it!”.
This was a great suggestion because if it’s on the internet, it’s got to be true. Hey, did you know that a duck’s quack doesn’t echo?
So, as we argued the toss (see what I did there?), we decided to Google it and, lo and behold, there were a plethora of videos uploaded by NOT chefs showing that pasta, when thrown at a fridge or a window (or a flat screen TV, or a work colleague’s face) does, in fact, stick.
At this point we argued that under-cooked pasta will also stick because, y’know, starch.
She wasn’t having any of it.
So, as we all went back to our desks, still disputing the issue, she collared the first person we came across and pounced on him; “Hey, how do you test if pasta is cooked properly?”.
He paused for a moment, clearly not expecting to be asked this question today, and replied with, “You throw it at the ceiling and see if it sticks”.
“YES!!” she screamed, victoriously throwing her hands in the air, before turning to us with fingers pointing, “See, I told you! Ha!”.
So let me get this right, your only reliable and factual back up is someone who is clearly NOT Google, and also throws his pasta ON THE CEILING to check if it’s cooked? Not only does his kitchen probably resemble a cave full of stalactites, but he’s also an idiot.
Being half Italian myself, I know how to check if your pasta is cooked; you time it and you taste it; it’s simple really. Hurling your food at a kitchen appliance is not a sure fire way to check how cooked your meal is.
Plus, it’s fucking up my fridge magnets.
Head In A Blender 