Spaghetti alla Chitarra Recipe (Guitar Pasta From Abruzzo)

Why You'll Love Making Chitarra Pasta

• Just two ingredients: semolina and eggs
• Make-ahead friendly: freezes well and cooks straight from frozen in 3 minutes
• More flavor than regular spaghetti because of the eggs in the pasta dough
• Rough, porous edges that grab every bit of sauce
• No special skill required
• Authentically Abruzzese, very hard to find outside of this region of Italy, and almost impossible to find outside of Italy unless you're at a restaurant owned by Abruzzese Italians.

What is Spaghetti alla Chitarra?

Pasta alla chitarra (also known as maccheroni alla chitarra, Tonnarelli Romana, or in English 'guitar spaghetti') is a variety of egg pasta made with semolina flour originating from the Abruzzo region of Italy in the provinces of Chieti and Teramo.

This delicious square spaghetti is typically between 2-3mm thick and is made using a square pasta cutter known as 'La Chitarra' or "the guitar" in English.

The pasta guitar tool is used to cut flat sheets of 00 flour egg pasta dough (see the photos below) into square-shaped spaghetti that leaves the chitarra noodles with rough, porous edges, perfect for allowing all kinds of sauces to cling to them. And this is why I prefer chitarra pasta to most standard spaghetti (and you probably will too!)

Chitarra vs. Tonnarelli (What's the Difference?)

Spaghetti alla chitarra from Abruzzo and tonnarelli (chitarra romana) from Lazio use the same two ingredients, semolina flour and eggs, and both are hand-cut from a rolled sheet rather than pushed (extruded) through a die like regular spaghetti. That is what gives them the same square, porous shape that holds onto sauce really well.

The real difference is size, and it depends on which Abruzzese cut you mean. The thin Pescarese, Chietini, and Teramano chitarra is finer than tonnarelli. But in Chieti, Pescara, and other parts of Abruzzo, cooks also make a larger square cut noodle, often called quadratto (spaghetti quadrati), that is essentially the same pasta as Roman tonnarelli. The two traditions both have a bigger cut, with tonnarelli usually just a touch thicker.

We've eaten this larger Abruzzese quadratto pasta many times, and it's often sauced exactly the way Romans dress tonnarelli, in a rich amatriciana and a peppery carbonara (see the photos above) or cacio e pepe. The thicker, chewier strands are made for those creamy, cheesy Roman sauces, which is why chitarra and its Roman cousin pair so well with carbonara and cacio e pepe.

You will also find similar square-shaped pasta around Molise and Puglia, slightly different in size or in how it is cut. Some go by other names too, like 'Chitarra Teramana' (thinner than standard chitarra), 'Chitarra con le Pallottine' (with tiny meatballs), 'Chitarrina' (also thinner, around 1mm), or 'Ciriole' (about twice as thick as spaghetti).

The Home of Chitarra Pasta, Abruzzo, Italy

Abruzzo has long been called "Rome's pantry," and the food here is as good as it gets because of the air, the soil, the sea, and ancient traditions that have stayed intact in so many communities across the region. The people are proud here, and they have great reason to be.

We have a second family home in Abruzzo, where we vacation in the summer and go back each November to buy the newly pressed olive oil and canned tomatoes for the year.

When we visit, spaghetti alla chitarra is always on the table. In our family, it's most often paired with a simple sugo di pomodoro, sugo di carne mista, or spicy sausage and tomato sauce. And it's always made from Abruzzese tomatoes (usually with whole dried pepper on the table with a pair of kitchen shears so you can add your desired chilis to spice it up).

Ingredients

This regional Italian pasta may not be easy to find where you live, but it's guaranteed to taste better if you make it from scratch anyway, plus, it uses just 2 ingredients (with the option to add a splash of extra virgin olive oil).

If you don't have semolina flour, use my 00 flour egg pasta recipe or my hybrid semolina and 00 flour pasta recipe.

• Semolina Flour: I've used a twice-milled semolina flour ('semola rimacinata' in Italian), which has a finer consistency than regular semolina, and it's what's used for making pasta here in Italy.
• Large Eggs: I've used pasta gialla eggs (Italian eggs with intensely colored orange yolks), but any large eggs will do. I recommend using antibiotic-free, organic, free-range eggs if you can afford them because they're much healthier and make a better-tasting pasta.

NOTE: OPTIONAL INGREDIENT (Extra Virgin Olive Oil) (optional, especially if the dough seems too dry, OR use a little water or a little extra beaten egg). EVOO isn't necessary, but it can add a little fat and extra flavor to pasta dough. I did not add EVOO to this dough, but feel free to add around 1 tablespoon (15g) if your dough seems dry.

How to Make Chitarra Pasta Step-by-Step (Maccheroni alla Chitarra Recipe)

This pasta alla chitarra recipe is easy to make, but you'll need a chitarra (guitar) to get the correct pasta shape.

If you don't have the 'spaghetti guitar', you can also look for a Pugliesi troccolaturo, which is a special rolling pin that cuts square pasta called Troccoli or Troccolo, but these pasta shapes are usually wider than traditional chitarra pasta.

Step 1. Add the flour to a countertop or in a large mixing bowl and create a well in the center. Add the eggs and, using a fork or your hands, start to incorporate the flour from the sides into the center until you have a shaggy dough.

Step 2. Knead the dough until smooth for about 8-10 minutes. Then rest the dough for at least 30 minutes or up to 1 ½ hours.

Step 3. Portion the dough into 4 equal pieces and roll the pasta into sheets using a pasta machine or a rolling pin. 

Step 4. Lay sheets of rolled pasta onto the chitarra cutter and use a rolling pin to roll over the top of the dough to cut it into strings.

Step 5. Dust the cut strands with flour to keep from sticking, and roll them up into a nest and place onto a flour-dusted sheet tray to rest before cooking or to freeze for cooking later.

Find the full recipe instructions in the recipe card.

How to Cook Chitarra Pasta (Tonnarelli)

The History and Origins of Spaghetti alla Chitarra

Spaghetti alla chitarra comes from the Abruzzo region of Italy. And the province of Teramo might be its most famous home, unless you ask my family from the province of Pescara 😉. The first written record of the tool itself dates to 1871, when the chitarra was listed in a bride's dowry in a Teramo notary's document, right alongside gold and household linens.

Before the spaghetti guitar, cooks shaped square pasta with a notched wooden rolling pin about 10cm long called 'lu rintrocilo' in the local dialect. It has deep built-in grooves that allow you to roll it over a piece of pasta dough, cutting the precise strands of pasta for you. Many Abruzzesi still consider it the chitarra's ancestor.

From Abruzzo, the shape spread across central and southern Italy under different names. In Lazio, it became tonnarelli, the pasta Romans use for cacio e pepe. In Molise, it is ciriole (crioli molisani), and in Puglia, troccoli, cut with a grooved (usually brass) rolling pin with 4mm thick strand cuts, called a troccolaturo. The size shifts a little from place to place, but the square, porous, sauce-catching shape stays the same.

That older 'lu rintrocilo' rolling pin tradition runs through both provincial Pescara and L'Aquila areas, the same corner of Abruzzo where Luca's mamma, papà, and larger family are originally from, including our Zia Linda. They grew up in a small paese near Pianella and Moscufo.

The traditional way to serve these in Teramo is chitarra alla teramana con pallottine, a tomato sauce with pallottine (mini meatballs no bigger than a hazelnut), made with bread, cheese, and mixed meats. They're fried before being added to the sauce. It's Italy's only real version of spaghetti and meatballs, and nothing like the American version(which doesn't exist here at all).

On our last trip, Luca's cousin Sandra and her husband Luciano, both wonderful Italian home cooks, gave me her small pallottine meatball press so I could make the dish properly at home. It's an incredible gift and privilege to have gotten to know a small part of a vast region so well and to take part in the traditions it has to offer.