Maximum price you would pay for a bowl of pasta

Hmmm. Which actually makes me realise something, which is that I will totally and happily seek out noodles in Chinese food, Japanese food, Thai food, East Asian fusion kinda food and eat them with relish. And I don't know if it's the "kind of preparation" involved with Asian as opposed to European noodle cooking. Or if I just don't like "Italian" (i.e. a particular British 70s interpretation thereof) food.

I think the Italians win the noodle battle (but Chinese cuisine wins the war because rice is better than any noodle)

Think there are plenty of Chinese who would disagree with you on rice being better than the noodle

But that was very much swayed by the term "bowl of pasta" while if you said "bowl of noodles" I'd pay £20-£25 (well, I would, if I had a job and ate out regularly again) for really well prepared vegetarian noodle dishes? That's odd, and I hadn't thought about that.

EastAsian fusion w/ relish, huh. the brits really have a panache when it comes to culinary crime xxxp

I bet, ENBB - did she ever take you to the glorious cheap pizza place Lorelei? That closed last year :((((

I mean, if you added "rice noodles" to the mix, like, rice is my favourite carbohydrate and you adding the amazing of rice to noodles, which is the best thing ever, obviously.

Ha! You making a pun. I meant, "eat with delight" but also, if we're talking about this odd place my friend and I always go to (near the British Museum?), well I could mean "relish" in the bowls of pickled condiments of obscure origin which are amazing on noodles.

pasta is one of the most efficient means of getting parmesan into my system and that's why i love it

Dayo where do you stand on rice vs. noodle

Hm I don't know the national origin of soba noodles but I would walk two hours for soba, and def prefer it to 90% of Italian pastas

In the end, with rice but is a very hard decision to make

I would have gone with noodles, no question, until I ate all the rice in Taiwan. Still a very hard decision and so I'm just gonna refuse to take a stan(d).

Choosing rice in the land of beef noodles, interesting

Rice is the greatest starch that exists

Not surprising though that an Italian xerox of a Chinese invention loses something in translation and only benefits after going through a process bearing remarkable similarity to the production of particle board

i know that noodles originated from china but to call modern-day italian pasta a "xerox" of chinese noodles is bullshit. there have been a huge number of agricultural and culinary exchanges in the past 500 years in most cases various cultures have adapted foreign ingredients and incorporated them into their own cuisines. i love traditional mexican food but i'm never going to say that other countries using chilis or tomatoes are a sad "xerox". it's one ingredient. similarly peruvian lomo saltado may be an approximation of chinese stir fries but it transcends mere approximation and becomes something else entirely.

300 posts by midnight gmt

it's a myth that fresh pasta is better imo, it's too mushy, you lose that al dente texture

no way am i reading this whole thread but i have no idea what terrible pasta experiences have led you to believe that this is true

eh, my in-laws are sicilian and they all pretty much agree with me. not saying fresh pasta is bad by any means, just that it's not necessarily better. i think there are some exceptions with certain pasta types (e.g. various stuffed pastas) but generally i think it's a myth that fresh is better. it's often inconsistent and unreliable.

will agree w/ 龜 xp that chinese noodles may benefit more by being fresh

I guess this is where I feel slightly ashamed that my tongue in cheek post reeled another poster in by the cheek entirely

$20 if it's incredible pasta but $15 seems reasonable for a nice restaurant

well sure nothing would be necessarily better if it wasn't made right or cooked right, but it's like very easy to make and cook delicious al dente fresh pasta

i just think fresh pasta tastes better.

btw i agree w/lamp, $25 is fine at a good restaurant

my answer to this question is that 99% of the time if i'm in an Italian restaurant I would choose pizza.

$15 but I've spent more. Tempted to say I should only spend >$15 in the small cities I've lived. Mid grade Italian restaurant food is the worst, but there seems to be a $$ threshold around here where it becomes a completely different thing.

I have an irrational thing against ordering pasta in restaurants because it feels somehow like an overly marked up item, which is silly because all food in restaurants is overly marked up.

we have one of those imperia pasta machines & you get really good pasta but it must not be worth the bother since it's been like a decade since we used it

voted $15 but that would only be in exceptional circumstances, great pasta's too easy to make at home to spring for it when out imo

It needs to have some rabbit ragu or some other special ingredient for me to pay mor than 16 or so.

I'm more happy paying $15+ if it's stuffed pasta or gnocchi, something besides what (even at good places) comes in a box

but some really wonderful things come in boxes

*gets down on one knee*

*restaurant goes silent*
*olive garden waitstaff gather*

*I think, 'thank god the chicken con broccoli was perfect tonight'*

there was a multicenturion thread about olive garden wasn't there

it does make me wonder if america wreaks the same godforsaken horrors upon 'pasta' that it does on 'pizza' but tbh the former is probably much more difficult

now i've lobbed that grenade, i'm going to run out amidst your zings

I just want to know why they only made the least significant word Italian in 'chicken con broccoli'

*calls over shoulder* it's not italian

Broccoli is an Italian word

Think yr projecting

I don't ever mind paying for good meals but I balk at expensive Italian meals.

Like the worst crimes against pasta weren't committed by my Mum clueless Britishers during the 70s.

tbf my mum is a terrible woman for the overcooked pasta everything, but I'm not in Britain right now, nor am I seeking to defend its approach to pasta

we have one of those imperia pasta machines & you get really good pasta but it must not be worth the bother since it's been like a decade since we used it

Worst argument I've ever had with my partner was the first and only time we tried making pasta with a machine.

Pasta attachment on a kitchen machine is a great way to do it.

ironically it only came with a single broccolo, xp

Broccoli is an Italian word

― a spectrum is taunting ur OP (wins), Friday, August 22, 2014 8:25 AM (52 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hmmmm, it doesn't seem to work

I think I'd pay upwards of $20 for really good rice vermicelli or flat rice noodles, but the menu pic threw me.

but I guess rice noodles don't count as pasta

I don't care what they say about how pasta should be good on its own and Americans over-sauce theirs. Imo you're NEVER paying for the pasta, you're paying for the all-day-cooked wild boar ragu or rustic bolognese sauce, and there better be sauce.

For me this is all a distant memory, as I fork in mouthfuls of brown rice with egg and cheese binder.

30 bucks. i'm not likely to buy $30 pasta any time in the near future, but that's the imaginary expenditure cap for when i don't. crab & urchin, please.