How to Cook Pasta al Dente

With regards to the actual cooking process, just be sure to follow these simple steps:

1) Fill a large, tall pot with water and place over high heat.

2) When the water begins to boil, add salt to taste. After the salt has dissolved and the water is really boiling, add pasta to the water and stir frequently the first two minutes, then occasionally until the end of the cooking process. Before draining the pasta, taste it to see if it is cooked to your liking.

3) If the pasta is “al dente,” you should feel slight resistance when you bite into it or cut it with a fork. There should also be a thin white vein at the center.

• Do not forget that the pasta will continue to cook out of the pot, so do not be timid in draining it while it is al dente.
• Pasta should be put in boiling (not cold) water so that the heat can reach the center of the pasta as quickly as possible and allowing the pasta to cook evenly.  As a matter of fact, salt is added to the water so that the boiling point is higher.
• The salt plays another important role: the salt must be dissolved into the water before the pasta is added in order to penetrate the pasta during cooking. This way the pasta absorbs the right amount of salt and cooks evenly.