Pennette
pen-NET-teh
Small penne, ridged, about 3.5 cm.
7 mm across, 1 mm wall
Name. Penne with the diminutive -ette. Little quills. Pennettine are smaller still.
What it is
Pennette is a small penne, about three and a half centimetres long and under a centimetre wide, and pennettine drops another size. They keep the diagonal cut and the ridges and cook a minute or two faster.
They are the tube for pasta salads, for children's plates, and for thick soups where a full penne would be clumsy.
How to cook pennette
8 to 11 minutes in boiling salted water. Al dente at 7 minutes, fully cooked at 11.
7:00
Start when the water returns to the boil.
Water and salt
- Pasta, dry
- 400 g
- Water
- 4 L
- Salt
- 40 g
100 g per person as a main. A litre and 10 g of salt per 100 g. Adjust with the portion calculator.
The steps
- Bring 4 L of water to a full boil in a tall pot. Add 40 g of salt when it boils.
- Add the pennette. Stir for the first minute so nothing sticks. Start the timer when the water returns to the boil.
- Bite a piece at 6 minutes. A hairline of white at the centre is al dente.
- Scoop out a cup of the cooking water. Drain, or lift the pasta straight into the pan.
- Toss with the sauce over the heat for a minute. Add cooking water a splash at a time until it clings.
Read more: what al dente means and why the pasta water matters. Times for every shape are on the cook page.
How it holds sauce
Small tubes take smooth and light sauces: tomato, a simple cream, pesto, an oil dressing for a cold salad. Chunks of meat or vegetable outsize the pasta.
Pairs with: Pomodoro · Pesto alla genovese · Tuna and tomato · Pasta salad · Cream sauce · Minestrone
Classic plates: Pennette al pesto, Pennette al pomodoro, Pasta fredda.
By brand: numbers, cook times, spec sheets
5 brands, 16 product pages. Cook times run from 7 to 12 minutes across brands, so read the box, not a rule. A blank cell is a figure the brand does not state.
| Brand | Product | No. | Cook | Length | Width or Ø | Wall | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| De Cecco | Pennettine no. 42 | 42 | 9 min, al dente 7 | ||||
| Rummo | Mezze Penne Rigate | 28 | 11 min | 35 mm | 8.2 mm | 1.3 to 1.6 mm | |
| Rummo | Penne Mezzane | 58 | 10 min | 40 mm | 6.4 mm | 1.3 mm | |
| Rummo | Pennette Rigate | 70 | 10 min | 40 mm | 5.8 mm | 1.3 to 1.5 mm | |
| Rummo | Mezze Penne Rigategluten-free | 28 | 12 min | 33 mm | 8.5 mm | 1.15 to 1.45 mm | |
| Rummo | Mezze Penne Rigatewhole wheat | 28 | 10 min | 32 mm | 8.2 mm | 1.2 to 1.5 mm | |
| Rummo | Pennette Alle Lenticchielegume | 70 | 7 min | 40 mm | 6.3 mm | 1 to 1.3 mm | |
| Mancini | Pennette Rigate | 8 min, al dente 6 | 40 mm | 7 mm | dried 22 h at 36 to 55 °C | ||
| Mancini | Mezze Penne Rigate | 9 min, al dente 7 | 30 mm | 10.2 mm | dried 22 h at 36 to 55 °C | ||
| Barilla | Mini Penne | 10 min, al dente 9 | |||||
| La Molisana | Mezze Penne Rigate N.19 | 19 | 11 min | ||||
| La Molisana | Pennette Rigate | 22 | 10 min | ||||
| La Molisana | Pennettine | 23 | 7 min | ||||
| La Molisana | Penne Mezzanine | 24 | 7 min | ||||
| La Molisana | Pennette Lisce | 35 | 7 min | ||||
| La Molisana | Mezze Penne Rigate Integraliwhole wheat | 19 | 10 min |
Nutrition
Per 100 g of dry semolina pasta. The shape does not change these numbers. The dough does, so a whole wheat or egg version of this shape reads differently. See every dough.
| Per 100 g | Energy | Protein | Carbohydrate | Fibre | Fat | Sodium | Iron |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dry | 371 kcal | 13.0 g | 74.7 g | 3.2 g | 1.5 g | 6 mg | 3.3 mg |
| Cooked | 158 kcal | 5.8 g | 30.9 g | 1.8 g | 0.9 g | 1 mg | 1.3 mg |
One portion. 100 g dry becomes about 235 g cooked, 371 kcal and 13 g of protein. Pasta takes on 2.3 times its weight in the pot.
Who makes pennette
5 pennette products are catalogued, most of them sold in France, United States, Greece. Of those, 1 are made in Italy.
Brands: Pam Panorama (1), Melissa (1), Zafarelli (1), La Molisana (1), Colavita (1), Industria Alimentare Colavita (1).
No pennette? Use these
Ranked by how they behave with sauce, not how they look. Full substitute list.
Side by side
Easy to confuse with
Other names
pennettine, penne piccole, mini penne.
Sources
- Pennettine no. 42, De Cecco (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate, Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Penne Mezzane, Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennette Rigate, Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate (gluten-free), Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate (whole wheat), Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennette Alle Lenticchie (legume), Rummo (cook time, catalogue number, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennette Rigate, Mancini (cook time, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate, Mancini (cook time, spec sheet dimensions, from the brand's own product page)
- Mini Penne, Barilla (cook time, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate N.19, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennette Rigate, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennettine, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Penne Mezzanine, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Pennette Lisce, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Mezze Penne Rigate Integrali (whole wheat), La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Cook time: De Cecco no. 42 (pennettine): 9 min.
- Open Food Facts (products, brands, labels), Open Database License, read on 2026-08-25.
- USDA FoodData Central (nutrition per 100 g, by dough: FDC 169736, Pasta, dry, enriched; FDC 169737, Pasta, cooked, enriched, without added salt), public domain. The cooked yield is derived from the two energy figures.
- Dimensions: brand spec sheets and measured boxes. Blank fields are unmeasured, never guessed.