Pasta for soup: the smallest shapes

At the scale of a grain, pasta behaves differently. The little shapes, the pastina, are not just small versions of big ones; they flip the job. A normal shape carries sauce on its surface. A tiny one has so much surface for its size that it absorbs the liquid around it instead, thickening a broth and turning soup into something between a drink and a spoonful.

Stelline and the alphabet

The smallest stars and letters are made for clear broths and for the bowls of children and the convalescent. They cook in a couple of minutes and barely need chewing, the most domestic pasta there is, the one most Italians met first.

Ditalini and tubetti

A step up, little tubes hold their shape in a heartier soup. Ditalini is the pasta in pasta e fagioli and in minestrone, small enough to ride a spoon, sturdy enough not to dissolve.

Orzo and fregola

Bigger still, orzo, shaped like a grain of rice, blurs the line between pasta and grain; it can thicken a soup or stand as a salad or a mock risotto. Fregola, the toasted Sardinian pearl, brings a nutty chew and is simmered with clams. Both are soup pasta that grew up.