Whether you’re not in a position to cook pasta on a stove right now, or it’s simply too hot to even think about standing in the kitchen while pasta cooks, one easy way I use to cook pasta is a one pot, no cook pasta method.
It takes longer than any other method, but the beauty of it is that you don’t need anything more complex than boiling water.
For each 100 grams of pasta you need a covered bowl approximately 0.5 litres (1 pint) in capacity – this is to be able to cope with the size the pasta will grow to as it cooks. I will typically make 100 grams of dry pasta – and will use my microwave noodle bowls as they’ve got a fitted lid, but you can just balance a plate on a Pyrex jug if that’s all you’ve got – that’s what I used to do.
- Add a splash of oil and a sprinkling of salt to your bowl
- Add 100 grams of dry pasta
- Add as much boiling water to the bowl/jug as you can, give it a stir around
- Put the lid on – the better the lid fits, the more of the heat you’ll keep in
- Leave the pasta in the hot water for 10-15 minutes, then drain it and add fresh boiling water. Recover and leave it to stand.
- Repeat as above until you can taste that the pasta is cooked enough for your tastes. It should really be “al dente”, which means you can still bite into it as opposed to it being mushy.
- Drain all the water from the pasta and rinse through with cold water until the pasta is cooled. Drain all the excess water off. (If you are using this recipe to try to make a HOT pasta recipe, then drain the water and top it up with fresh boiling water for 2-3 minutes to bring it up to temperature again, then drain and use it).
Sometimes I’ll start the pasta off as above, when I think I’ll be wanting pasta “later”, then I’ll drain the jug of most of the water and microwave it for 2 minutes to finish it off. It all depends how patient you are!
The point here is it is POSSIBLE to cook pasta by this method if you want to, or have to.