Pasta. A word likely to evoke thoughts of shapes like spaghetti, ziti, or ravioli. No surprise, certainly. The most well-known and global of pasta dishes use them. They’re essentially ubiquitous as industrially-produced commercial products in many countries.

Really, though, to say that pasta in Italy is varied feels grossly insufficient. The regionality of Italy’s past and present is on full display in pasta: the shapes, grains, doughs, fillings, final preparations, and even names differ from region to region, town to town. Look no further than one of my most cherished references, Oretta Zanini de Vita’s pastario Encyclopedia of Pasta, or the work of Vicky Bennison for Pasta Grannies.

Growing up, my nonna made Sicilian maccheroni or busiate. By the case load. She’d spend an occasional Sunday kneading, rolling, and shaping pasta for both dinner and to be frozen for the weeks to come. A young me had no idea that these shapes were just one small piece of a very large puzzle. What the hell did I know about fusi istriani?

I’ve spent the last few years exploring pasta’s hyper regional and seemingly infinite depths. Much like my desire to perpetuate my mom’s red sauce and my nonna’s biancomangiare, I want to make as many of these as I can to help keep them in the world. To play a part in sustaining my heritage and history amidst an increasingly commercial food culture that sees people cooking less and less.

E allora a small quest I’ve set for myself is to do an alphabet crawl of pasta, making one shape for each letter. Conveniently, starting at A at the top of September means the first of PA’s fall bounty will be available to fill agnolotti. At a minimum, I’ll get to discover new shapes, techniques, and recipes. At best, I hope to share those discoveries with others, and maybe even encourage someone to make pasta along t:he way.