SPAGHETTI SCIENCE

Required background reading for spaghetti lovers everywhere.

There isn’t much about Italian-style spaghetti that Rush doesn’t toss into the pot. Writing in bouncy, enthusiastic prose and frequently pausing to ask probing questions, she describes just how durum wheat is grown, harvested, milled to semolina flour, turned to dough, and then cut, dried, and packaged; she also explores the physics behind the fact that an uncooked noodle will always break into three or more pieces. Along with spooning in a gallery of alternative pasta shapes like gnocchi and fregola, she explains the differences between spaghetti and other types of noodles, such as ramen, spätzle, and fideo. Then, for hands-on readers, she lays out step-by-step instructions for making and cooking spaghetti with tomato sauce from scratch; for science-minded youngsters, she includes an experiment that involves constructing a pasta “bridge” and testing its tensile strength. In the flat, simple illustrations, brown- or light-skinned hands reach into sight to show off wheat grains, knead dough, hold up a plateful of steaming goodness, and, at the end, point to a QR code from which newly certified “spaghetti scientists” can download their official diplomas. Bellissimo!

A deliciously informative pasta primer.