strigoli
Name. One Tuscan producer links the name to strigare, to untangle or twist, after the rolling motion that shapes each strip. Not confirmed elsewhere.
What it is
Strigoli are a short, twisted pasta rolled by hand. Italian Wikipedia describes strips of dough about 2 cm wide rubbed between the palms into a spiral, then cut into pieces about 5 cm long. The traditional dough is flour and water. The result looks like a loose cord or, in one food guide, a fat worm. Dried versions from Tuscan makers use durum wheat semolina and water, pass through bronze dies, and cook in about 6 minutes.
The sources disagree on origin. Italian Wikipedia, citing the Slow Food dictionary of regional cooking, places the shape in Veneto and Trentino. Two Tuscan producers present it as a Tuscan tradition. A food glossary reports the homemade version in Umbria, Lazio, and Romagna. The shape is close to strozzapreti and trofie. Producers pair it with wild boar ragu, sausage sauces, zucchini cream, and herb pesto. The same word names an edible wild plant, bladder campion, used in Romagna pasta sauces.
How to cook strigoli
6 minutes in boiling salted water. Take the shorter time for al dente, the longer time for fully cooked.
6:00
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 strigoli. Stir for the first minute so nothing sticks. Start the timer when the water returns to the boil.
- Bite a piece at 5 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.
What it is served with
Pairs with: Wild boar ragu · Sausage ragu · Meat ragu · Pesto alla genovese · Vegetable ragu
By brand: numbers, cook times, spec sheets
1 brand, 1 product page.
| Brand | Product | Cook |
|---|---|---|
| Centellino Selection | Strigoli 500 g | 6 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.
No strigoli? Use these
Ranked by how they behave with sauce, not how they look.
Other names
stridoli.
Sources
- Strigoli 500 g, Centellino Selection (cook time, from the brand's own product page)
- Wikipedia (it): Strigoli (pasta) (profile: origin, form, use)
- Gerardo: Strigoli, Pastificio Chelucci (profile: origin, form, use)
- Centellino Selection: Strigoli (profile: origin, form, use)
- Italian Food Decoder: strigoli (profile: origin, form, use)
- Cook time: Centellino Selection Strigoli 500 g: 6 min.
- 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.
- Strigoli (pasta), Italian Wikipedia (summary), CC BY-SA 4.0
- Q130532079, Wikidata
- Dimensions: brand spec sheets and measured boxes. Blank fields are unmeasured, never guessed.