Lazio · cheese · medium
Best pasta for gricia
Guanciale, pecorino, pepper. Carbonara without the egg. It wants a rough tube or a wide strand that holds the fat.
- Region
- Lazio
- Base
- Cheese
- Texture
- Medium
- Shapes that hold it
- 5
- Classic plates
- 5
What it asks of a shape
Gricia is a medium cheese-based sauce. It wants ridges, because the sauce has body and needs a grip, a tube, so the sauce rides inside as well as outside, and a long strand, so the sauce coats every turn of the fork. The ranking below scores every profiled shape on those traits, then the shape's own sauce notes break the ties.
What it is
- Main ingredients
- Guanciale, pecorino romano, black pepper
- Place of origin
- Lazio
Pasta alla gricia is a pasta dish originating in the Lazio region of Italy, made with guanciale, pecorino romano, and black pepper.
5 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.
Mezze maniche
Tubes · All of Italy
Short and wide, so each piece fills with sauce: carbonara, gricia, amatriciana, a sausage ragu.
Tonnarelli
Long strands · Lazio
A porous square strand grips a cheese emulsion like nothing else, which is why Roman trattorias serve tonnarelli cacio e pepe.
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.
Rigatoni
Tubes · Lazio
The widest bore of the everyday tubes, so pieces of sausage, eggplant, or braised meat ride inside it.
Classic plates with gricia
Every dish in the shape profiles that names this sauce, with the shape it is made on.
- Bucatini alla griciaBucatini
- Mezze maniche alla griciaMezze maniche
- Mezzi rigatoni alla griciaMezzi rigatoni
- Spaghettoni alla griciaSpaghettoni
- Tonnarelli alla griciaTonnarelli
Sources
- The ranking and the sauce notes are our editorial judgement, from the traits in each shape record. See the method.
- Pasta alla gricia, Wikipedia (summary, ingredients, origin), CC BY-SA 4.0. Wikidata Q55641393.