We’ve written before at HuffPost UK about the secret ingredient Italians use to balance out the acidity of tomatoes in their pasta sauce (nope, it’s not just sugar).
We’ve even shared the pivotal spice Italians swear by that other countries often neglect.
But it was only when I saw a TikTok from app user @steelpan.guy titled “my Italian nonna’s special sauce hack” that I realised I hadn’t been prepping my pasta for sauce properly.
The “special” secret will make “any pasta you make ten times better,” the app user claimed.
What is it?
The poster poured a pot full of steaming plain pasta into a bowl.
On top of that, he added “a boatload of Parmesan cheese and a little handful of butter before [he] put the tomato sauce on.”
Using the same spoon he’d stirred the tomato sauce with, the TikToker stirred the butter and cheese into the otherwise-undressed pasta until the butter melted.
“It’s gonna create this amazing coating that’s just gonna suck up the sauce,” he commented while stirring.
“My nonna would only do this once in a while, she’d call it ‘special.’ So you don’t have to do this every time,” he shared.
Claire Lower, now the digital editor for culinary hub 177 Milk Street, wrote about the same trick for Lifehacker in 2021.
“You only need two things to prevent pooling and help your sauce stick to your pasta — a little bit of butter and some starchy leftover pasta water,” she revealed in the article.
“Tossing your marinara (or other sauce) and al dente noodles with those two ingredients creates a velvety emulsion that clings to the pasta, permeating it with flavour and preventing those unsightly little pools.”
People had *thoughts* in the comments
“No big secret... us Italians all do this” one comment read (though unsurprisingly, others disagreed).
Other commenters recommended using olive oil instead, which the poster acknowledged his nonna “sometimes” did.
“My Nonni would put a pound of butter on the spaghetti before pouring the sauce over it,” another commenter wrote before explaining “it was for a family of eight.”
Other TikTokers said they swore by the method, with one writing, “the butter makes the sauce velvety and really shiny.”
I mean, more butter and cheese? You just can’t convince me that’s a bad idea...