Pasta Database

Ricciolini

Short shapes

Short wide pasta with a 90-degree twist.

Name. Diminutive of riccioli, curls: little curls.

What it is

Ricciolini are short pieces of pasta twisted into a curl. The dried commercial cut is a wide strip about 5 centimetres long with a quarter turn twist, so it looks like a short piece of ruffled ribbon. Zanini De Vita's Encyclopedia of Pasta records a handmade version. That dough is durum or type 00 flour, salt and a few eggs, kneaded stiff. The cook cuts narrow strips 3 to 4 centimetres long and curls them into corkscrews with oiled hands.

The encyclopedia entry gives no region, and no other fetched source settles one. The handmade ricciolini are cooked in broth. The dried cut goes into soups and into pasta e fagioli. Its folds hold thicker sauces, and it also works in baked dishes.

What it is served with

Pairs with: In brodo · Pasta e fagioli · Meat ragu · Baked (al forno)

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 gEnergyProteinCarbohydrateFibreFatSodiumIron
Dry371 kcal13.0 g74.7 g3.2 g1.5 g6 mg3.3 mg
Cooked158 kcal5.8 g30.9 g1.8 g0.9 g1 mg1.3 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.

No ricciolini? Use these

Ranked by how they behave with sauce, not how they look.

Conchiglioni, uncooked, on linen

Conchiglioni

Short shapes · All of Italy

Same family, also solid, shares 2 sauces

Cascatelli, uncooked, on linen

Cascatelli

Short shapes · United States

Same family, also solid, shares 1 sauce

Gnocchetti sardi, uncooked, on linen

Gnocchetti sardi

Short shapes · Sardinia

Same family, also solid, shares 1 sauce

Sources