Not Just Pasta -- This Company Has Cooked Up A Local Noodle Empire

Pasta & Co. is becoming a little empire of local excellence.

Once upon a time in America there was no such thing as pasta.

There were spaghetti and macaroni, ravioli and sometimes on Sunday lasagna.

All of the above were dry and hard and cheap and came in sauces that were always red.

Occasionally on the East Coast or in San Francisco you heard of pasta, as in pasta fazool (macaroni and beans, more properly spelled and pronounced pasta e fagioli). But that, until the 1960s, was pretty much it.

Linguine was beginning to sneak in. And fettuccine. And white sauces. And some new guy named Alfred, or was it Al Freddo?

(Eventually we learned he wasn't new at all. In fact he was either very old - or dead. Alfredo di Lellio created Fettuccine Alfredo at his restaurant (Alfredo's) in Rome in 1920. Two American film stars, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, ate it there, loved it, and it became an overnight American success 45 years later.)

Pasta, by the mid-1970s, was called pasta and thereby increased dramatically in market value by roughly 300 percent, adjusted for inflation, and frequently more. Fresh pasta, whether made at home on an imported Italian, hand-cranked machine that left gouges in your counter tops or kitchen tables, or in a restaurant, became all the rage.

Some of what was made was OK, some was better than that, and a few others were superb.

Marcella Rosene's pastas, first made at her original Pasta & Co. store in University Village, circa 1981, fit into that last category easily.

Great stuff made fresh daily in the back room was snapped up out in front by hosts and hostesses who wanted to serve the best to their tennis friends - and not spend seven hours on a Saturday afternoon sweating over it, since there were only five hours really available on a Saturday afternoon anyway, and when were you supposed to play tennis?

In the words of Pat Finley (local actress, singer, dancer, TV morning show host and golfer now living most of the year in France): "My friends have complimented me for years on my fabulous, delicious pasta dishes (your fantastic take-out foods). Now, you're (Marcella) sharing all of your secret recipes (in a second cookbook, "Pasta & Co. By Request") and making an honest woman out of me. Thanks . . . I think."

I started using Pasta & Co. on an embarrassingly regular basis about 10 years ago, buying items like Marcella's Tortellini Salad with ground olive pesto and garlic-parsley gremolata.

Marcella Rosene didn't start out her professional life as a food manufacturer-shopkeeper. She began as a staff writer for Business Week magazine in Southern California right out of college. She and her husband, Harvey Rosene, started up Pasta & Co. 14 years ago, "with no more food credentials than a history of good home cooking and two lively palates."

The number of palates expanded as they accumulated a talented staff of cooks and pasta makers, and as their number of stores grew. There are now four: downtown Seattle at Fourth Avenue and Spring Street, opposite Bellevue Square, and on Queen Anne (2109 Queen Anne Ave. N.) in addition to the original U Village store.

The shops are small and (only an ex-writer would use the term) well-edited. "We have to be. We hold `editing' meetings all the time. DeLaurenti's may be able to stock 30 olive oils. But because we are small, we may only have room for eight. They HAVE to be the RIGHT eight. Our customers have to be pleased at what we have chosen for them," she says.

Despite her Italian-sounding name, she is not Italian "and we never do anything in the store using red, green and white displays. Pasta and noodles are global. One of our best sellers, right from the start, has been our Chinese Vermicelli Salad" (based on a recipe originally by San Franciscan Barbara Tropp).

"And we are more than just a noodle shop."

The company was a stable, steadily growing enterprise specializing in fresh-made pastas, with strong sidelines in frozen dinners (the cannelloni is surprisingly authentic, with ground veal and spinach), sauces, a deli counter, spices, crockery, cookbooks, fresh-baked breads (from Grand Central Bakery, La Panzanella and Macrina) and their own desserts.

Total pasta volume? More than a ton a week.

They make, box and freeze their own pizza dough ($2.50 for enough to toss a 13-inch pie). And, increasingly, more vegetarian and "lighter" foods. "The lower fat emphasis started about three years ago. We started using less cream and more stock. Good palates are tasting differently now."

A third Pasta & Co. cookbook is in the works with, predictably, a greater attention to reduced-fat dishes. One of the earlier recipes, Jade and Ivory, still popular, shows the contrast. It's rich and satisfying, but can have the basic oil and cheese dressing scaled back.

"We still use it, but like many of our earlier recipes," said a veteran employee, "it's rich and well-dressed."

JADE AND IVORY Serves 8 as a side dish

1 cup extra-virgin olive oil (or try blending half avocado oil with Santa Barbara Olive Oil)

1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice 3 cloves garlic, peeled and pressed

1/4 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon crushed red-pepper flakes 20 grinds of fresh pepper - preferably green peppercorns 3 tablespoons whipping cream 1 pound fresh egg pescine noodles (or substitute bow ties or farfalla) 1/3 cup mizithra cheese, grated 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, freshly grated 1 cup chives or green onions, finely minced 1/2 cup fresh parsley, finely chopped 2 cups frozen peas, thawed, well-drained, but not cooked; or 2 cups blanched asparagus tips, cut no longer than 2 inches Garnish: additional 1/2 cup chives, finely sliced, or additional 1/2 cup green onions, sliced diagonally 1/8 inch thick 1. In a large bowl, whisk together olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, salt, red-pepper flakes, ground pepper and whipping cream. Reserve. 2. Cook pescine (or other pasta) to al dente in boiling salted water. Drain, rinse with cold water and drain again.

3. Immediately toss pasta with the dressing, using a large rubber spatula, until well coated. Let cool to room temperature (up to 1 hour), then fold in the cheeses, chives, parsley, and peas or asparagus.

4. Put pasta on serving platter. Top with additional chives or green onions.

(Copyright 1995, John Hinterberger. All rights reserved.)

John Hinterberger's restaurant and food columns appear in The Seattle Times in Sunday's Pacific Magazine and Friday's Tempo. Benjamin Benschneider is a Times photographer.