I Cooked 100 Years of Pasta

On today's video I am cooking 100 years of pasta and we're going to be rating them from one to ten so you know which one is best. And we're going to start off with this one. Welcome to the 1910s. This pasta is the symbol of Rome and like the Colosseum is truly iconic the simplicity of this pasta is like no other. But to get it right it is not as easy as you might think. This pasta only has three ingredients pepper, cheese and pasta that is all you need. And the reason it's so simple to make has a history. You see this is sheep's milk and a very long time ago sheep's herders needed something to eat and they used their own cheese to make a creamy pasta called cacio e pepe. So a crucial ingredient will be the pecorino cheese. The first thing you want to do is to grate this as fine as possible. Using a micro grater makes things easy however you can also throw it in the blender getting this as fine as possible. Once that's done you want to go ahead and cook the pasta. You want to use a good pasta for this one, one that has texture. You see this one it is a sign of high quality pasta as it will release a good amount of starch and this rough texture will also grab the sauce. When cooking the pasta you don't want to use too much water that's because the starchy water is extremely important. And as the pasta is cooking you want to go ahead and reserve a little bit of this pasta water. Let it cool off a little because we want to mix this with the pecorino cheese. And if you put it too hot it can actually melt the cheese and make it stringy. That's not what you want. To be specifically you want it under 180 degrees Fahrenheit. Just add little by little and keep mixing it until you make a cream, a nice thick cream just like this. As the next step is to get a pan and toast up some black pepper. You want it to be freshly cracked black pepper because if it's too fine it will burn. As soon as you can smell that black pepper aroma it's time to grab some pasta water and immediately put it in the pan. Shake the pan and prevent the pepper from burning. As once that's done you want to go ahead and grab the pasta and immediately throw it in there. Mix everything together make sure you coat that pasta with that black pepper. The more you mix the better and at the same time add pasta water as needed. You don't want this thing to dry it should be slightly wet. As to finish this one up add the pecorino cream we made previously and vigorously start tossing and shaking the pasta. Because the idea is this as everything is mixing together you will slowly melt the cheese emulsifying everything together making a nice delicious creamy sauce. Now this is cacio e pepe. So you want to go ahead and plate it up, add more pecorino cheese on top if you like, followed by some freshly ground black pepper. The most important part about this pasta is that you must eat it immediately, you cannot sit. Now this is the way to start a hundred years All right cheers guys. Cheers. It's perfect that's perfect. The simplicity of the dish is what makes it good and there's no way to make it better. Yeah back in the day they were eating good apparently because this is this is amazing I'm not gonna lie. Pecorino and pepper it's all you need on pasta man. 10 out of 10 for me. 10 out of 10. 10 out of 10. I'm going for seconds but on to the 1920s. In this decade there was a high migration of Italians coming to the U.S. Most came to New York City. They started working and they had a lot more money because the beginning of this dish was not like this. Instead of large meatballs they were tiny, tiny. But now Italian Americans could afford a lot more meat so our version of spaghetti and meatballs was created. To make it you first want to take some stale bread and combine it with some milk, mix it up a little bit and squeeze the milk out. We're just trying to bring it back to life. Now into a bowl combine some ground beef, the bread that was just made, followed by garlic, parsley, salt, black pepper and parmesan cheese. Mix it well and combine all of these ingredients together. As once that's done you want to make some nice small balls. About one and a half inches thick is good and as you already know it's much larger than the original Italian version. Now into a pan add a generous amount of olive oil then immediately throw in the meatballs. You want to brown them under medium high heat, this is your chance to get a nice beautiful color on them. And as that is happening you want to go ahead and get your tomato sauce ready. Canned tomatoes are the best for this. You can go ahead and crush them by hand or if you have a food meal it's even better. Just run the whole can through it and in the end you should be left with this consistency, nice and smooth. And by this time our meatballs should be having a nice beautiful color on them. However take a look at the bottom of the pan this is called fond, it has a tremendous amount of flavor. We don't want to let this go to waste. To deglaze it you want to do it with a tiny bit of white wine. Mix everything up a little bit like if you were cleaning the pan. As once the fond starts releasing immediately add in the tomato sauce, followed by some salt and freshly ground black pepper. As now you want to mix the whole thing and let them cook. And as that was happening you want to go ahead and cook your pasta. Use good quality spaghetti, one that has texture like this will work just great. The smooth ones is not the best. To cook it you want to go ahead and follow the instructions in the package. And to finish this up you want to go ahead and add some of just the tomato sauce, followed by the cooked pasta, and of course a little bit of pasta water. Toss it and shake it well. Now add some parmesan cheese, toss it a little bit more so everything can combine, and add a generous amount of meatballs and more sauce. The only thing left to do now is to go ahead and plate it up. And as you are doing so make sure to be generous with the meatballs. And obviously add some parmesan cheese and parsley right on top. Now that is a true classic. I mean take a look at it. Spaghetti and meatballs, we love it for a reason. It is good. Cheers! Cheers! Yeah that's actually really good. That's fire. It tastes authentic. It was lightly garnished with what parmesan I guess it was, but it was very strong. I don't know what type of parmesan it is, but it really hits. I'm not a big fan of cheese, but it goes well with the spaghetti. 1920s done, on to the 1930s. In this decade times were tough. The great depression was not easy and Kraft came out with its boxed macaroni and cheese option. Back then one box could feed a family of four for only 19 cents. So Kraft quickly sold over 8 million boxes in one year. And one of the reasons they did so it was because it was ridiculously easy to make. First you want to go ahead and boil the pasta. Then on another pan you want to go ahead and add some butter, let that melt a little bit, then add some milk followed by the powder mix. Mix that really good until everything fully combines. Now add the pasta. Mix everything together until it's nice saucy and creamy. And in the end you are left with the classic mac and cheese we all grew up eating. I mean take a look at it. Most adults no longer enjoy it, but it is still extremely popular with the younger audience. Cheers everybody. Cheers. I want to trash it but I can't. The nostalgia factor is just, it's weighing on me heavy right now. This is good. This brings you the childhood memories and all that. Definitely reminds you of like summer camp or something like that. This is good you know. This is not the way that I prefer to eat it because Kraft mac and cheese by itself is a little bit mild. It's a little bit bland. So I normally put like more seasonings or some cheese on top of something like this but this is not bad. The actual flavor is like nothing to write home about. It's okay but let's move on right to the 1940s. So far every pasta I've made has not been controversial but the next one is. And that's because this pasta is loved by Americans but it was actually born in Italy. So I went ahead and flew all the way to Italy to find out how it was originally made. So this is the original Alfredo restaurant meaning that where everything came from the original way of making Alfredo pasta. And they are proud of it. Take a look at the menu. The original only includes three ingredients fettuccine, parmesan cheese and butter. Now it's all about the technique and how to make it. Okay so we're gonna get an access of how they make it everybody because it's not the way the American style do it okay. It's very different the original version. Let's see. Thank you for having me. Okay so he boiled the pasta first. That takes no time at all since it's fresh pasta. Over there he has a big chunk of butter. Now that will go directly into the butter. Also collecting that pasta water. That's very important if not you won't have the emotion. Not emotion. Emotion. A little bit more pasta water. Oh it's almost soupy huh because then you add the parmigiano-reggiano. And how long is the parmigiano-reggiano? 24 months? 24 months. 24 months excellent very good. Okay he's going to add a generous amount of parmigiano-reggiano. There you go. Oh a generous amount. Two spoons. Oh two spoon and a half excellent. Okay and now we finish it on the table. And the last part is the easiest one of them all. He just mix everything together creating an emotion. The heat of the pasta melts the cheese and the butter together combining it to a creamy and special sauce. Here are a few things to keep in mind. Number one he's using fresh pasta that is crucial for the texture and most importantly might be the butter. He's using an European butter very similar to Kerrygold that we have here in the US. And since this pasta has very few ingredients it is quite important to get it right. But maybe the most important one of them all is the 24 months parmesan cheese. And just like that that is how it is made everybody. No cream, no nothing. Oh my God! Oh wow! It is so cheesy you taste more cheese than anything else. The creaminess, savoriness. Forget every fettuccine alfredo you ever had. This is where it's at. Honestly this is an experience everyone should have. And to make sure I'm not being biased on our rating on our pastas it's time we have some more opinions. That's a pasta. So cheesy, so flavorful. It's super creamy as well. Purely cheesy and creamy dish. I've never had such a cheesy pasta and it tastes really good. I think we all know this is amazing. The only problem is where is the chicken? This is our next pasta. The true history of it is unclear. Some says its birth is linked with charcoal burners in the Apennines while others attribute it to American soldiers who arrived in Italy during World War II. One thing is for sure in the 1950s this was a hit. Now first the meat. You really want to find this guanciale. It is cured pork and most people think it's similar to bacon or pancetta but in all honesty it's really not. Usually you will find this in any Italian supermarket and you can always get it online. After cutting it up you should be left with something like this. A nice little strip with ratio of mostly fat and a tiny bit of meat. And that is what you want because we're going to be mainly using the fat. So under low heat you want to start cooking the guanciale. Keep the heat low. We want everything to melt nice and slow. If you rush the process it will burn and you will ruin everything. Next up the pasta. I'm using this high quality spaghetti. Notice the rough texture. You want to cook it following the instructions in the packaging. And as that was going into a bowl you want to add some egg yolks, followed by grated pecorino romano, generous amount of freshly ground black pepper and whisk vigorously everything together. This is our carbonara cream. As now using the same pan we cooked the guanciale notice that I still have a good amount of fat in there. So go ahead and throw the pasta right on top. Mix everything together so you can coat the pasta with the guanciale oil. Go ahead and add some pasta water in the process also. Because next up you want to add the cream we just made, all of it. Now toss and mix everything together and as you're doing that the sauce will start becoming extremely creamy. The more you toss the creamier it gets. Make sure to keep everything under low heat or turn the heat completely off. The last thing we want is to cook the eggs. We want a nice creamy pasta just like this. Because once this is done you want to go ahead and plate it up, add a generous amount of pecorino romano on top, followed by that beautiful guanciale we cooked previously. And you can always add more black pepper to your liking, because in the end you are left with this incredible dish carbonara. Maybe one of the most famous roman pastas. And I'll tell you one thing it is famous for a reason, absolutely delicious. Oh man! The guanciale is perfectly crispy, the egg yolk and the carbonara is the key in my opinion. Because it makes everything so creamy and it brings everything. It almost like emulsifies everything together, brings in all the ingredients that makes everything work perfectly. The word that I would use to describe this is richness. The guanciale is very savory, very salty, even the pecorino it's very good. I mean there's a reason why they call this one of the mother pastas. I'm ready for the next pasta. Can we go to the 60s please? Absolutely. Let's go. Now this next pasta is unlike any other and that's because it's cooked like a risotto. Now at the same time it is almost burned and the history on how it was created is fascinating because there are two versions. The first one is that a chef forgot a pasta cooking on the stove and he got burned but he served it to the customer anyway. The second one on the other hand it was actually a real recipe. A roman chef in Bali was asked for something new and he remembered an old recipe that his daughter used to make. So he brought it back to life putting his own twist on it creating pasta alla sassina. Now which version is true? And to find out I flew all the way to Italy and to be specific I landed here in the place that does nothing but specialize in this pasta. So I went ahead and had a conversation with the chef asking him which version was actually true. Okay the second one make a risotto version of this spaghetti and make it crunchy and spicy. So the story about they left it burning over there is not true? It's not true it's a true recipe. Can you show me how to make it? Oh absolutely. He starts off with extra virgin olive oil, a generous amount of chili flakes, some garlic powder and toast that up a bit. Then he immediately throws in some raw spaghetti. Yes a hundred percent raw because what he's trying to do here is to toast them up. He's looking for a crunchiness just like this. Next up he added some tomato sauce followed by some pasta water. And the idea is to do this several times because as you're doing so the spaghetti will start absorbing everything, cooking it little by little just like you would a risotto. You want it to be caramelized and charred not burned. But there's one important thing that I did not know about. You have to make it in a non-stick pan? Yeah. It has to be. Not non-stick pan because if you put in something like aluminum or iron the pasta will start to break. To break because you cannot cut the spaghetti in half yes? Absolutely not you break my heart. Don't you ever break the spaghetti everybody. You'll go to jail here in Italy if you do that okay. Every time you And as you can see by this time the spaghetti is not only fully cooked but he absorbed all of the water and sauce. And the only thing left to do was to plate it up. Now he did make some other variations for me to try. Some had stracciatella on top, another one had anchovy cream and even some capers. Now these are all variations that he made and I was ready to try either one of them. It's so fantastic and after you take a bite the umami flavor stays in your mouth because you can still feel it. It's already done but it's still there. This pasta is a flavor bomb. It is the only one that you eat it and you will still feel the flavor 30 minutes later. It's delicious. But I don't want you to take my word for it as I want to see how this one stacks up with the rest. Oh I do taste it. I do taste the little burnt bits that I was seeing before and I also taste a lot of spice. Oh she hot. I wasn't expecting it to be that spicy like as soon as it makes contact with your tongue but it's like instant. You know when you cook this you're cooking it straight onto the pan so you get those crunchy bits. I really like the texture that makes with the you know normal pasta texture so. It's not really a crunch it's more of a crisp but it's somewhere in between pasta is perfectly al dente. It's amazing. I think that's enough for the 60s let's move on to 70s. Our next pasta is the easiest and most simple pasta ever. It's a summer dish that anyone can make. Created in Rome pasta alla cecca needs one main thing. Get the best quality ingredient you can because you almost don't need to do anything with this pasta. Funny enough you can actually use any type of pasta you like. Today I'll be using rigatoni. Into a bowl you want to add some fresh tomatoes followed by chopped basil, fresh mozzarella, parmigiano-reggiano, salt and pepper and of course extra virgin olive oil. Mix that up real good and once the pasta is fully cooked add that mix right on top. Toss everything so you can fully combine and get a nice coating on the pasta and the only thing left to do is serve. This is a pasta that is usually served cold. It is perfect for summertime and as you just saw it right there it is super simple and easy to make. Oh yeah. In general this dish just feels like really light, refreshing. Some pasta dishes sit kind of heavy not this one at all. This is definitely one of those pastas you can have like on a hot summer day next to a pool or at the beach or something. This would be perfect. It's weird because most of the time flavor of pastas comes from whatever sauce you're cooking it with or you're putting on top. You can't really see a sauce here but it is super flavorful so it's like my mind is a little weird. This pasta dish was delicious but now let's move on to the 80s. Most people think this pasta was created by Americans, however it was actually invented by an Italian in the 80s and it is called penne alla vodka. Now to make this is actually quite simple. You first want to get a nice large pan, add a tiny bit of olive oil in there together with some chopped up pancetta. Cook this up for a little bit until the pancetta starts melting. As soon as it starts getting a little bit of color like this go ahead and add some onions. Mix everything together and combine until you start getting nice beautiful color and everything. Make sure to keep it under low heat if not the pancetta is gonna burn. Once you've gotten a nice beautiful color it's time to deglaze the pan and for that we're gonna use some vodka. If you want to go ahead and ignite the flame and by the way you don't really have to do this. If you just let it simmer by itself most of the alcohol will burn off because in the end you just basically want to deglaze the pan. As you can see the bottom is nice and clean. Now you want to go ahead and grab a can of tomatoes, crush them up really good, throw that into the pan and stir everything together. Add salt if needed, keep the heat on medium and once everything becomes drier like this go ahead and add some heavy cream. You're basically looking for a nice color just like this. Now for the pasta you want to use penne. Once it's fully al dente throw that right back into the sauce because the next step is quite important. You want to go ahead and toss everything up as much as possible to make it super creamy and traditionally this is it. Because the only thing left to do is to go ahead and plate it up. But of course if you are a cheese lover like we are go ahead and add some right on top because this is penne alla vodka. Cheers everybody! Cheers! Bro that is amazing. It's still creamy but it's a thicker sauce so the pasta holds it a lot better. The actual vodka in the actual dish you don't really taste it and I would know because I know exactly what vodka tastes like. But I think Guga outdid himself on this one but I'm excited to see what's next in the 90s. I'll stay here. And we start off with the meat king of all pastas guanciale. I've said it many times and I'll say it again this is the key of many Italian dishes. It can't be replaced with bacon, pancetta or anything else. You really want to try to get your hands on this especially if you never had it before because for the next roman pasta it is a crucial ingredient. As we're going to be making pasta all'amatriciana. Think of it as the most delicious tomato sauce pasta you've ever had in your life. And to make it it's quite simple. After cutting up the guanciale in small strips just like this you want to go ahead and throw it in the pan. Notice that I didn't put any olive oil or anything else and that's because we want to use the rendered fat of the guanciale. This is a lot more flavorful than any other oil you can put in there. You want to go ahead and get a nice golden brown color on your guanciale. Make sure to keep it under low heat because we need this fat. Next up I went ahead and remove all of the guanciale and set it aside. Then you want to grab a can of whole tomato and crush it up. You can definitely do it by hand but if you have a food mill it's gonna be a lot easier, as once you're done you should be left with something like this. Now throw that right into the pan with the guanciale fat. Bring it to medium heat and let it cook. Season it with salt and black pepper now. Mix it well and taste it for seasoning as next you want to go ahead and cook your pasta. A lot of people love to use bucatini for all'amatriciana but for this version today I'll be using rigatoni. After cooking it up to the instructions in the packaging I went ahead and threw it in the pan. Then I added some pasta water, now a generous amount of pecorino romano. Then you want to toss the whole thing until it becomes extremely creamy. Get ready to get a little messy that's totally fine because once you're almost done you want to go ahead and add that guanciale right on top, toss it a little bit more and in the end you want to go ahead and plate it up for serving. And of course you can always add more cheese if you like because this is pasta all'amatriciana. If you love a red pasta you're definitely gonna like this one. Cheers! Cheers! I need to go for another bite that was so good. To be honest I prefer the vodka better. I really like the meat flavor that the guanciale adds plus like the tomatoes are a little bit sweeter. Yeah this is like really different from everything else I have tried. Has like a way richer flavor to it. I prefer the vodka one it's a no-go for me. I'm ready for the 2000s. Let's go! Next one is when Roman started getting really creative. This is a combination of two pastas you've seen before. Think cacio e pepe and carbonara without eggs. Then you get pasta alla gricia and it is quite simple to make. First up we start with the king, guanciale. You want to go ahead and cut it in small strip as we did previously and throw it in the pan and cook it under low heat. Make sure to render that fat nice and slow we're gonna need Once the guanciale has a nice beautiful color you want to go ahead and remove it and reserve as we'll be using this fat left behind in the pan. Next up to cook the pasta. I'll be using a high quality spaghetti for this. I cooked it following the instructions in the packaging. Once that's done into a bowl I added a generous amount of pasta water followed by pecorino romano. Then you want to grab a whisk and whisk this all together because you want to add that pasta water little by little. Just like cacio e pepe we want to make a nice smooth cream because in the end you should be left with a creamy texture just like this. As now into that guanciale fat I added my pasta. Toss it really good to combine all of these things together because next comes a generous amount of the cream we just made. Make sure to turn off the heat at this point, shake it well and toss the pasta and once everything is combined add a tiny little bit of black pepper. Shake it and toss it a little bit more the only thing left to do now is to plate it up. To finish it add some freshly ground black pepper, a good amount of pecorino romano and of course the guanciale goes right on top. Now this is what happens when cacio e pepe and carbonara have a baby. A pasta that deserves more credit because it is absolutely delicious. Oh yes it is! All right cheers guys let's see what this is about. Cheers! Cheers! Oh my lord! The guanciale is so amazingly crispy. The pasta is great but screw the pasta just give me a bowl of the guanciales and I'll eat that straight. I don't even care. I actually really like the pasta because it has that like peppery flavor, it's creamy. Honestly one of my favorites so far. All right well there you go guys let's see what they have for 2010. And on the very next pasta we took creativity to its max. And if you really want to give it a try you're definitely going to have to make it yourself because you won't be able to find this one anywhere. Now to make it it's not as complicated as you think, however you do need a few special ingredients. Starting off with the cheese, a truffle cheese. So the first thing to do is to open it up. You want to go ahead and remove the cover and immediately start craving a crevices with the cheese. Don't worry though because nothing it's gonna go to waste. We're gonna be using this to make our sauce as well. Once I was done check it out, it is our serving plate. For the pasta I'll be using spaghetti. I just follow the instruction in the package like always because next up instead of guanciale this is the real king of all meats, wagyu. Oh yes! Now just like guanciale this has a amount of fat and I'll be using it exactly the same way. The first thing to do is to cut it in small strips, then into a pan it goes to cook up and render that fat. I season it with salt and pepper and continue cooking it until it was nice and crispy. Oh yes! Then into another pan I went ahead and used that wagyu fat, threw my spaghetti in there, added a generous amount of pasta water, tossed the whole thing up and added that cheese that we previously carved. You want to go ahead and toss it as much as possible because the more you do the creamier it gets. But we're not done yet because I went ahead and carved some more cheese from the bowl as then I added some flaming bourbon. This helps the cheese melt. Once I got a nice creamy texture I went ahead and added my pasta, tossed the whole thing up together. As to finish it up I'll be using this black truffles. Shout out to my mushroom dealer the link will be on the description because he not only hooked me up with this but also that beautiful cheese. So I went ahead and shaved a generous amount on top of the cheese followed by some crispy pieces of wagyu and that is an invention that Italians might not approve. But something you should definitely try wagyu and pasta together. It is in my opinion a perfect combination. Cheers everybody! Cheers! Wonderfully creamy pasta and it feels like the sauce isn't too overpowering at all. I know I said I wasn't a huge fan of truffle it still has a little bit of a hint but it's not as overpowering as I was I would have expected. The saltiness from the wagyu definitely helps the truffliness. You would think it'd be a little bit too rich mixed with the creaminess of the pasta but work really well together. It's just really nice you can really enjoy everything to the max. Absolutely I give this a 10 out of 10. And with that being said guys that's a wrap for 100 years of pasta. I hope you guys enjoyed this video if you did hit that thumbs up. If you're not a subscriber be sure to subscribe and I'll see you guys on the next one. Take care everybody. Bye-bye.