Pasta usually starts with a large pot of boiling water. One home cook skips both parts of that routine, putting dry pasta into a wide pan with cold water before turning on the heat.
Reddit user u/ILoveLipGloss uses the method for flat pasta such as spaghetti. The water just needs to cover the noodles, which means less water surrounds the same amount of pasta as it cooks. The payoff is starchier water for sauces that need help coming together, including cacio e pepe.
Put the Dry Pasta in the Pan First
Start with the pasta in a wide pan rather than bringing a full pot of water to a boil.
Add enough cold water to cover the noodles, then turn on the heat. Another cook in the discussion uses the same approach, covering dry pasta by about an inch before starting the burner.
Cooking time becomes less predictable with a cold start, so watch the pasta instead of relying on the package time.
Less Water Leaves More Starch in the Pot
Pasta releases starch as it cooks. Using less water means that starch isn’t dispersed through a large volume of liquid.
Several cooks in the discussion use the low-water method for that reason. One commenter said the water needs to barely cover the pasta, while another cooks pasta in a frying pan so the shallow water reduces as the noodles cook.
Less water also reaches cooking temperature sooner, though the pasta needs more stirring because it has less room to move without sticking.
Save the Concentrated Water for the Sauce
The starchy water isn’t a byproduct to pour down the drain.
One cook uses a ladle to take water from the surface, including some of the white foam, then adds it to the sauce. The pasta itself comes out a few minutes before it is finished and completes its cooking in the sauce.
That gives the pasta more time in the pan with the sauce while the cooking water reduces.
Watch How Much Salt Goes Into the Water
Less water also changes how much salt you need.
One commenter warns against making concentrated pasta water too salty, since part of that water may end up in the finished sauce. Another cook who switched from a large pot to a sauté pan also reduced the amount of salt because the cooking water wasn’t being discarded.
Taste and adjust rather than applying the same amount of salt you would use in a large stockpot.
A Wide Pan Makes the Method Easier
Long pasta doesn’t have to wait for the submerged ends to soften when the pan is wide enough to hold the strands.
One commenter cooks pasta in a frying pan with shallow water and stirs more often to keep it cooking through. Another uses a sauté pan instead of the traditional big pot and lets the pasta heat along with the water.
Starting pasta in cold water sounded backward to me because boiling the water first is such an ingrained step. But the point isn’t cold water for its own sake. Using a wide pan and less water concentrates the starch you can carry into the sauce instead of diluting it in a stockpot.
Would you start spaghetti in cold water, or does the pot need to be boiling before the pasta goes in?
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