Rotelle
roh-TEL-leh
Wagon wheel with spokes.
Name. Little wheels, from rota. Ruote is the other name.
What it is
Rotelle are wagon wheels: a ring with spokes to a hub, about two and a half centimetres across. Ruote is the same word; American brands say wagon wheels. It is a shape aimed at children and at salads.
The spokes cook unevenly and the wheels break easily, which keeps it out of serious kitchens.
How to cook rotelle
9 to 11 minutes in boiling salted water. Al dente at 10 minutes, fully cooked at 11.
10:00
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 rotelle. Stir for the first minute so nothing sticks. Start the timer when the water returns to the boil.
- Bite a piece at 9 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
The spokes catch small pieces and a light sauce. Pasta salad, a simple tomato, a cheese sauce, a soup.
Pairs with: Pasta salad · Pomodoro · Mac and cheese · Minestrone
Classic plates: Wagon wheel pasta salad, Rotelle al pomodoro.
By brand: numbers, cook times, spec sheets
2 brands, 2 product pages. Cook times run from 9 to 12 minutes across brands, so read the box, not a rule.
| Brand | Product | No. | Cook |
|---|---|---|---|
| De Cecco | Rotelle no. 54 | 54 | 12 min, al dente 10 |
| La Molisana | Rotelle Pasta | 71 | 9 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 rotelle
17 rotelle products are catalogued, most of them sold in United States.
Brands: New World Pasta (2), F Lli de Cecco di Filippo Fara S Martino S P A (2), Creamette (1), Nwpc (1), Ronzoni (1), Hyvee (1), Safeway Inc (1), Signature Select (1), San Giorgio (1), De Cecco (1).
No rotelle? 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
Biciclette, rotelline, rotine, rotini, ruote, ruotelline, ruotine, wagon wheels.
Sources
- Rotelle no. 54, De Cecco (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Rotelle Pasta, La Molisana (cook time, catalogue number, from the brand's own product page)
- Cook time: De Cecco no. 54: 9 min.
- Photograph: Rotelle2.jpg, Popo le Chien, CC0.
- 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.
- Rotelle, Wikipedia (names, origin), CC BY-SA 4.0
- Q869366, Wikidata
- Dimensions: brand spec sheets and measured boxes. Blank fields are unmeasured, never guessed.