The mystery of the smooth pen in the time of the Coronavirus – Italian Cuisine


Reviled and offended, abandoned in supermarkets, in reality they are among the most loved by Italians

These lines you read are a strenuous, decisive and powerful defense of the smooth pens, worthy of Alicia Florrick or Harvey Specter in their most televised moments.
I saw with horror the social accusers, those empty shelves except them, the only survivors, or abandoned: the smooth pens, in fact.
Sorry: but why don't you like them?
They are soft, delicate, they grab the sauce with delicate ease, they take over our palate by caressing it, they kiss the butter with the elegance of a geisha while playing shamisen, they sit with soft kindness in the remote corners of our oral cavity …
And you? You who run to the supermarket as if the world is about to end, leave them there?

One thing, this, inexplicable for me. I, who spent years looking for them when I lived abroad, just can't understand. What better are all the other pasta to be snubbed as if they were plagued?
Protagonists of the Norma, excellent with the classic salmon vodka, perfect in a baking dish with tomatoes … In short, of recipes, in our pages of "La Cucina Italiana", we have published many.

I came to this conclusion: the problem of smooth pens is entirely Milanese and I, until these technical tests of apocalypse, I had never noticed. So now a doubt arises: but how many guests at my table will have fake love for my favorite pasta without revealing the slightest sign of disappointment?

"I continue to look at this photo taken before at the supermarket and I think of the fact that the great defeat of this virus are the smooth pens that Italians make even when they are panicked and preparing for the apocalypse" (photo twitter. com / diodeglizilla).
"I continue to look at this photo taken before at the supermarket and I think of the fact that the great defeat of this virus are the smooth pens that Italians make even when they are panicked and preparing for the apocalypse" (photo twitter. com / diodeglizilla).

Fortunately, the South is giving me tasty satisfactions. Yes, because it is here that one third of Italy's smooth pens are sold. We are talking about a total of 2.5 million tons, where Barilla is in first place with a 31% share. But legend has it that the first pasta factory to offer it was Voiello, and history has it that the smooth pen is the mother of all the other pens, which came only later, like the rigate. And if it were not so, and I want to believe that it is, how could those delicious penne alla sciaguratella with tomato, butter, garlic, extra virgin olive oil, chilli pepper, basil and cream be explained in Naples?

And then there are other numbers that make us understand the injustice of that abandonment on the shelves of Milanese supermarkets: the important market share that De Cecco occupies, which is around 15% of the total. Then, with smaller volumes, Pasta Rummo follows: here the penne are solidly placed in 13th place between spaghetti and bucatini, with 1.4% of the market against champion spaghetti.

And anyway, to avoid any misunderstanding, the Doxa reveals that the penne are on the podium in the ranking of short pasta for all Italians (it also includes the rigata, but oh well).

So tonight for dinner tonight … strictly smooth!

This recipe has already been read 200 times!

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