Lazio · tomato · medium
Best pasta for amatriciana
Guanciale, tomato, pecorino, chili. A short cooked sauce with pieces in it. Bucatini in Rome, spaghetti in Amatrice.
- Region
- Lazio
- Base
- Tomato
- Texture
- Medium
- Shapes that hold it
- 9
- Classic plates
- 1
What it asks of a shape
Amatriciana is a medium tomato-based sauce. It wants a hole down the middle, so a strand carries sauce inside, a long strand, so the sauce coats every turn of the fork, and ridges, because the sauce has body and needs a grip. The ranking below scores every profiled shape on those traits, then the shape's own sauce notes break the ties.
What it is
- Place of origin
- Amatrice (province of Rieti), Lazio
- Also called
- Amatriciana (in Italian)
- Type
- Sauce
Amatriciana sauce, known in Italian as amatriciana, is a sauce made with tomatoes, guanciale, pecorino romano or pecorino di Amatrice cheese, black pepper, dried chili pepper, extra virgin olive oil, dry white wine, and salt.
9 shapes that hold it
Bucatini
Long strands · Lazio
The bore takes in sauce, so bucatini wants a sauce with more body than a strand normally takes: amatriciana, a gricia, a tomato with guanciale, a loose ragu.
Mezzi rigatoni
Tubes · All of Italy
As rigatoni, with a shorter tube that fills more easily: sausage ragu, amatriciana, a chunky vegetable sauce, the oven.
Rigatoni
Tubes · Lazio
The widest bore of the everyday tubes, so pieces of sausage, eggplant, or braised meat ride inside it.
Perciatelli
Long strands · Campania
As bucatini: a sauce with body that can fill the bore.
Mezze maniche
Tubes · All of Italy
Short and wide, so each piece fills with sauce: carbonara, gricia, amatriciana, a sausage ragu.
Tortiglioni
Tubes · Campania
Spiral ridges hold sauce the same way straight ones do, so it takes ragu, sausage, tomato with pieces, and baked dishes.
Fusilli lunghi
Long strands · Campania
The spiral traps sauce in its coils and the bore takes some inside, so it carries more than a plain strand.
Occhi di lupo
Tubes · Campania
As mezze maniche: sauces with pieces, a ragu, sausage, the oven.
Spaghettoni
Long strands · Campania
A thick strand releases more starch and stays firm longer, so it suits the Roman cheese sauces that need starchy water to come together.
Classic plates with amatriciana
Every dish in the shape profiles that names this sauce, with the shape it is made on.
- Bucatini all'amatricianaBucatini
Sources
- The ranking and the sauce notes are our editorial judgement, from the traits in each shape record. See the method.
- Amatriciana sauce, Wikipedia (summary, ingredients, origin), CC BY-SA 4.0. Wikidata Q997633.