The Grocery List: The Pasta Shop
The Pasta Shop is everything its name makes you think of: an incredible variety of pasta and delicious Italian specialties from all over the place! You can find chocolate from Piedmont, salt from the ancient salt ponds used by the Popes in Cervia, canned tuna and anchovies from Sicily, and Tuscan extra virgin olive oil. It is always a treat to walk down the aisles and discover yet another hard to find product on its shelves!
Amaretti di Saronno cookies, for examples, are not easy to find in regular stores. The Pasta Shop keeps a stack of the elegant tin boxes these cookies traditionally come in, and always save my need around the Holidays, when I use Amaretti to make crust for Christmas desserts! Amaretti are also singularly wrapped, as you can see from the picture below. Legend has it that a baker from the city of Saronno invented these cookies for a Pope in visit to its city, using the kernel of apricots. The traditional bitter flavor is reminiscent of almonds and sometimes these are used- but the “original” recipe is kept secret!
Other great finds at The Pasta Shop: an amazing charcuterie counter with prosciutto di Parma, mortadella (roughly compared to “bologna” in the US, but I swear the Italian mortadella is a completely different experience!), coppa, various types of salami, and so much more!
The pasta selection: from artisanal pasta to hard to find shapes (each pasta shape in Italy only goes with a handful of pasta sauces), The Pasta Shop will satisfy every craving- malloreddus, tagliatelle, fettuccine, gnocchi and orecchiette are just a few of the types you will find on the shelves.
The Pasta Shop also carries one of the most extensive Balsamic Vinegar selection available in the Bay Area. In fact, they don’t just carry Aceto Balsamico, which can be found nowadays in almost every store. Their selection of Tradizionale, the diamond head of all balsamic vinegar, is impressive. A discussion about what makes Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale worthy of a locked case could go on for a while. To make it super brief, we’ll just say that what is bought today as “balsamic vinegar” is a watered-down version of the original from Modena: a mixture that seasons in wood barrels for as long as 100 years, and takes on a texture more similar to maple syrup than vinegar. It is more fit for strawberries and ice cream than salad, and it’s just the kind of product you want to have in your pantry. We got a bottle of it for our wedding and we treasure it as an amazing treasure!!
The Pasta Shop
Rockridge Market Hall
Phone: 510-250-6005
1786 Fourth Street
Berkeley, CA 94710
(510) 528-1786
Filed under: East Bay, The Grocery List
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