Can you cook pasta with the gas turned off? This is now a pressing question for me — and millions of Italians — as the Kremlin weaponises natural gas in an effort to punish Ukraine’s allies.With Gazprom squeezing gas supplies to Europe and fuel bills surging, Italy has urged its citizens to save energy with “virtuous actions” such as shorter showers, turning the heating down, and running washing machines and dishwashers fully loaded. What caught my eye, though, was the official advice to lower the flames on stoves once water pots are boiling — a seemingly cryptic guideline that Italians immediately understood as an instruction to use less gas while cooking pasta.
As a reluctant cook, I often rely on pasta for quick meals, making it according to the traditional Italian method in an uncovered pot of vigorously boiling water. Yet I’m acutely conscious that European energy consumers are financing Russia’s war machine. This summer, every salad I made felt like an act of solidarity with Ukraine. But with my energy bills still rising, and winter coming soon, I need to find out whether it’s possible to cook pasta in a more energy-efficient manner.
According to Nobel Prize-winning Italian physicist, Giorgio Parisi, the answer is definitely yes. In a recent Facebook post, Parisi advised that pasta can be cooked on a low flame if the pot is covered to stop the heat from dissipating. Prominent architect Alessandro Busiri Vici went further still, insisting pasta can be cooked with the flame off completely — so-called “passive cooking” — further reducing gas use. The trick, Busiri Vici wrote, was to boil water, add the pasta, keep the water at full boil for two minutes, then close the flame, keeping the pot covered for the rest of the cooking time.