Few things speak to the quality of pasta more than the techniques employed for its making. From the flour and water that go into the dough to the dough’s kneading and mixing all the way to the finished product’s extrusion and drying, every step makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts.
Most of us think of great pasta as having three characteristics: it’s dried, it’s imported from Italy, and it’s made from 100% durum-wheat semolina — the earthy, coarse, golden-skinned flour milled from European durum wheat.
Yet one characteristic of great pasta is often overlooked, and that’s the material of the dies used in the pasta’s extrusion. Don’t let the technicalities involved scare you away: This is easier to get than it sounds, and understanding what it means will take your pasta game to a whole new level.
How Pasta Gets Its Shape
Commercial pasta starts as a mix of semolina flour and spring water. The flour and water are poured into machines that mix and knead dough, then force it out through dies — metal plates with specially shaped holes — to create the shapes we all know and love like spaghetti, penne, fusilli, etc.
These dies are coated with either Teflon or bronze. Modern manufacturing methods often use Teflon-coated dies because they’re cheaper to maintain and push pasta out faster. Tradition, however, dictates that the dies are coated with bronze, despite its higher cost and slower production speed.
The reason? Bronze-coated dies make better pasta.
Why Bronze Makes Better Pasta
When pasta dough meets a bronze die, something magical happens. The metal’s porous surface creates microscopic ridges and grooves in the pasta — texture.
Although these imperfections might seem minor, they fundamentally change how the pasta behaves in your kitchen.
They trap and hold onto sauce, ensuring that each bite delivers the full flavor of your dish.
Whether you’re making a simple aglio e olio or a complex ragù, bronze-cut pasta helps marry the sauce with the noodles in a way that pasta produced without bronze dies simply can’t match.
Finding Quality Bronze-Cut Pasta
Look for “bronze-cut,” “bronze-die,” or “trafilata al bronzo” on the package. Premium Italian brands like De Cecco, Rustichella d’Abruzzo, and La Molisana are reliable producers who still use this traditional method.
While bronze-cut pasta typically costs more than mass-market alternatives, the difference in quality makes it worth the investment. The improved texture and sauce-gripping ability transform even the simplest pasta dishes into something special.
Think of it this way: The pasta you choose forms the foundation of your dish. Starting with better pasta means ending up with a better meal — and that, at least in my book, is something worth paying a little extra for.