Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Unleavened dough, made of wheat flour, water, and sometimes eggs, that is molded into any of a variety of shapes and boiled.
- n. A prepared dish containing pasta as its main ingredient.
Wiktionary
- n. uncountable (particularly in Italian cooking) Dough made from wheat and water and sometimes mixed with egg and formed into various shapes; often sold in dried form, it is typically boiled for eating.
- n. uncountable A dish or serving of pasta.
- n. countable A type of pasta.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Any of a variety of edible unleavened doughey preparations made from flour, eggs and water, originating in Italy, and shaped into various forms, such as solid strings (as spaghetti), hollow tubes, or layered squares (ravioli). They may be mixed with various sauces, often having a tomato base, or filled with meat or cheese fillings.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a dish that contains pasta as its main ingredient
- n. shaped and dried dough made from flour and water and sometimes egg
Etymologies
- From Italian pasta, from Latin pasta ("dough, pastry cake, paste"), from Ancient Greek παστά (pasta, "barley porridge"), from παστός (pastos, "sprinkled with salt") (Wiktionary)
- Italian, from Late Latin, paste, pastry cake; see paste1. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Tonight I will: eat something delicious. * pasta pasta pasta*”
“The basic meaning of the word pasta today is nothing more specific than “paste.””
“Laura said ... noble pig: the word pasta is for grown-ups, of course -- anything served at lunch to the girls in this house is a noodle.”
“Bring a pot of salted water to a bowl, add the pasta and cook until the pasta is al dente.”
“The word pasta is uncountable in English, as are the names of individual types of pasta (spaghetti, cannelloni, etc.), although these names are Italian plural forms.”
“Book Five is all about what he calls pasta—which still meant pastry and dough, so pies, tarts, and fritters are the main topics of interest rather than maccheroni, vermicelli, and ravioli.”
“Assemble salad while pasta is still warm: Combine pasta, tomatoes, asparagus and parsley in a large serving bowl; mix in dressing.”
“Semolina: Made from the endosperm of Durum Wheat, usually used in pasta and pizza crusts due to the elasticity from gluten.”
“Regular chili over pasta is just chili mac, you can get that at any steak and shake.”
“A person familiar with the thinking of Ralcorp's board said Monday that Ralcorp viewed ConAgra as being "opportunistic" with the latest offer, making the proposal when Ralcorp performance was lagging and the company wasn't buying back shares because it was paying down debt from its prior purchase of private-label pasta company American Italian Pasta Co.”
The Wall Street Journal: ConAgra Withdraws Bid After Ralcorp's Rejection
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘pasta’.
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The Pasta Master
My favourite is potato
gnocchi,interesting that lists
devoted to pasta exclusively
missed pasta puttanesca,those who
really textually mine dictionaries
would not miss...manicotti, spaggers, stelline, spaghettini, spag, linguine, fettuccine, penne, rigatoni, mezzani, zita, spaghetti and 391 more...
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IMCO - EU nomenclature
includes words of the "Prodcom list"
veal, valve, used, yak, wax, wan, teak, vat, vas, strip, use, strap and 4515 more...
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Gesundheit
Words that sound like sneezes
zucchini, zoology, wysiwyg, woodchuck, withhold, wichita, vacuum, twelfth, syzygy, synchronous, swatch, supersede and 120 more...
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vegan
vegan food list of basic vegan food or types of vegan food you've had and liked.
( food, cuisine, eating, health, vegan, vegetarian, animal rights, anti-cruelty, no meat, herbivore, s...tofu, hummus, falafel, cookie, soy, nuts, fruit, burrito, veggie burger, soy cheese, rice, pasta and 52 more...
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Noodles: Slurp 'em up!
Noodles and noodle types from around the world.
Who's hungry?wheat, udon, tea, sweet potato, soba, Sevian, rice vermicelli, rice stick, rice sheet, rice, quenelle, potato and 23 more...
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colleen's words
yellow, green, pie, blue, fur, people, incense, book, brown, avuncular, mountain, fog and 1316 more...
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Words I like
This is a list of my favourite words (phrases) in english, as a second language. I love them mostly because of how they sound and their meaning.
ninja, cookie, skill, zip, plentiful, digg, debris, pancake, cucumber, fetch, pot, backpack and 461 more...
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parody's Words
defenestrate, behemoth, floss, macchiato, glom, emu, alpaca, crocheted, ampersand, charade, conflate, salacious and 193 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
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savage215's Words
pipe, yankee, knickerbocker, tennis, plasma, magma, volcano, car, truck, television, tv, word and 445 more...
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food
food, chef, spice, salt, sugar, pumpkin, apples, fruit, vegetable, savory, soup, sauce and 280 more...
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dirtysnowflake's Words
snowflake, parisian, couture, mystery, ruby, clandestine, corset, october, list, touch, caress, aboulia and 156 more...
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words my 19-month-old daughter says
We'll skip people's names.
basketball, light, railroad, mommy, daddy, up, hand, gate, walk, kitty, doggie, cat and 145 more...
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junestag's Words
postmodernism, cat, fish, rabbit, dell, coffee, elearning, mazda, php, mysql, flash, blogger and 755 more...
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MacBean's Words
verisimilitude, antediluvian, schadenfreude, eviscerate, exsanguinate, onomatopoeia, aesthetic, apocryphal, aubergine, byronic, brouhaha, bordello and 523 more...
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jmjarmstrong's list
Words that I used to know.
geloscopy, hunker, willy nilly, harum scarum, whacko, meh, nork, misunderestimate, atrabiliousness, luftmensch, auxanometer, hyperhedonia and 1948 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for pasta.
jmjarmstrong JM knows that those that forget the pasta are doomed to reheat it. Jul 13, 2011
tbtabby Means "briefcase" in Portuguese. Jul 13, 2009