For list of dishes prepared using pasta, see Gemelli pasta of pasta dishes. There are many different varieties of pasta.

For example, the cut rotelle is also called ruote in Italy and wagon wheels in the United States. Manufacturers and cooks often invent new shapes of pasta, or may rename pre-existing shapes for marketing reasons. Long pasta may be made by extrusion or rolling and cutting. Made with whole wheat rather than durum. Hollow straws Translated from Italian: buco, meaning “hole”, and Italian: bucato, meaning “pierced”. Often coiled around a twig of local weed.

Very thin spaghetti, often coiled into nests. Possibly from the thin iron square used to create the cleft. Little ribbons: from affettare, “to slice”. Possibly from Latin lasanum or Greek lasonon, “Cooking pot”, or the Greco-Roman laganum, a flat piece of bread. Long rectangular ribbons with ruffled sides. From Tuscan papparsi, “to pig out”.