What Makes A Good Pasta Great?

As well as proper slow drying and bronze-drawing production methods, the quality of the grain used is fundamental.

An organic guarantee in pasta is essential because of the high level of chemical exposure commercial wheat is subject to, both in cultivation and storage. It’s less critical for products like artichokes or figs, which aren’t chemically treated so harshly in the first place.

Water quality plays a vital role in pasta production too. We use spring water from the mountain above the valley where the wheat is grown. Good pasta needs water that doesn’t contain conditioners like water softener, although this isn’t checked for currently in organic certification.

Cheap wheat floods the commercial pasta industry, grown without provenance or GMO-free guarantee. The durum wheat used in Seggiano Pasta is grown on a handful of organic farms in the Orcia Valley of Tuscany.

Our producer harvests the grain and immediately transports it to an organic mill, whereupon it’s cleaned and pressurized in CO2 to inhibit insect contamination without chemicals or pesticides. Each is milled and marked with a lot, date of harvest and the farm from which that grain originated for full traceability.

Organic Italian durum is high in wheat proteins and gluten, known as the parte nobile of the wheat. Its quality is the major factor in the final consistency and taste of a pasta. 

The acid test is in the cooking

Try cooking Seggiano pasta for two or three times longer than the suggested cooking time and you will see that it doesn’t turn mushy or gluey like most other brands – it remains al dente; it still has flavour. You can reheat Seggiano Pasta the next day, and it will still taste good, a testament to the quality of grain used and the production process, which doesn’t cut any corners. 

When pasta is dried fast at high temperatures, it loses proteins and gluten. We slow dry for a minimum of 26 hours at a temperature below 45º, which preserves the wheat’s original proteins and gluten quality and gives the pasta its excellent consistency and flavour.