Why Milk Street Calls for 12 Ounces of Pasta

Question

I only see 1 lb packages of pasta in the store- but a lot of recipes call of 12 oz of pasta. Is there a reason why the recipes only call of 12 oz of pasta?

Elizabeth Mindreau · Accepted Answer

Hi Dominic,
Our early pasta recipes called for 12 oz dried pasta. The thinking was that 12 oz pasta yielded correctly sized portions—not too little, not too much—for four servings and ignored the fact that there would be 4 oz uncooked pasta left over. We eventually recognized that having bits of bobs of extra pasta in the pantry is super annoying, so we started developed recipes using a full pound of pasta.

Why Milk Street Calls for 12 Ounces of Pasta

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