What Italians Call Chaos, We Call Indian Pasta
We fry it. We spice it. We drown it in sauce. The result? The tastiest remix South Asians never meant to create.
When comedian Zarna Garg makes pasta, she breaks the spaghetti into pieces and adds them into the pot before the water starts to boil. When her kids inform her that both of these moves are big no-nos in Italian cooking, she responds confidently: “Like the Italians know pasta? Indians know how to cook everything.” Two Italians jokingly reacted to the video, yelling “don’t break the spaghetti!” with a horrified look.
You might just think that Garg is playing into rage bait cooking — a new genre of social media that provokes viewers with absurd, rule-breaking, and sometimes flat-out gross combinations of food. Think: ice cream in your ramen, pickles in your cereal, and spaghetti with raw chicken. South Asians aren’t exempt from the trend: there’s matcha paneer, pani puri water with matcha, and even reconstituting frozen Indian meals with water in a pan. For some, Indian pasta is similar in eliciting rage. The pasta? Not al dente. The seasoning? A mix of garam masala, garlic-ginger paste, and peppers. But the result? Maybe the most delicious dish in the world.