Tag: penne

Penne (pronounced /?p?ni?/ [UK], or /?p?ne?/ [US]) is a type of pasta with cylinder-shaped pieces. Penne is the plural form of the Italian penna, deriving from Latin penna (meaning “feather” or “quill”). In Italy, penne are produced in two main variants: “penne lisce” (smooth) and “penne rigate” (furrowed), the latter having ridges on each penna. There is also pennoni (“big quills”), which is a wider version of penne. The same or similar shape is also called mostaccioli (meaning “little mustache” in Italian, a form of penne lisce that is smooth, not ridged, in texture) and ziti (long hollow rods which are also smooth in texture and have square-cut edges; “cut ziti” are ziti cut into shorter tubes), and can refer to particular dishes made from penne-shaped pasta. There is also zitoni, which is a wider version of ziti. It can be somewhat difficult to differentiate between subtypes of penne in the USA, since regional differences in product naming can result in both ridged and smooth…