Simple Spaghetti

30 min · serves 4

Ingredients

• 2.25 L (10 cups) water
• 8 oz (224 g) spaghetti
• 2.5 cups (24 oz) pasta sauce (optional but recommended)
• Salt (optional but recommended)
• Vegetable oil (optional but recommended)

Steps

1. On a stovetop, bring the water to a boil on high heat after adding salt and vegetable oil (see tips below).
2. Reduce heat to medium and add the pasta.
3. While the spaghetti is cooking, pour desired amount of sauce into pan and set stove to medium.
4. Set a timer for 7 minutes. When the timer goes off, fish out a strand of spaghetti and bite into it. What you're going for here is al dente, meaning that the pasta is just soft enough to eat: no longer crunchy in the middle, and not mushy and over-done. A more traditional (but messy) way to see if the spaghetti is done is to throw some strands onto a wall. If they stick to the wall, then the pasta is ready to eat.
5. When the sauce begins to bubble, reduce the heat to its lowest setting and cover.
6. Once the pasta is ready, carefully drain it through a colander into a sink.
7. Serve sauce over pasta in bowls.

More recipes with pasta

Adapted from “Simple Spaghetti” in the Wikibooks Cookbook by its contributors, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Reformatted for this site; this page's recipe text is shared under the same license.