Pasta  Producers . . . since  the  beginning  of  time!

Extraordinary Stories of Pasta are rooted in ancient times ... Roads were full of carts loaded with sacks of durum wheat semolina, scents of dried Pasta hanging on canes, moved by the winds, the noise made by the “scugnizzi”( street-urchin), who picked up the broken pasta... the trumpets of street vendors ... this is the scenario where 500 years ago the best Pasta in the World was produced in Gragnano! The artisan production was born from the mix of Gragnano’s natural spring water and the durum semolina that took place in a mixing tank (fig.1); the Pasta was then amalgamated in the “gramola” (Fig. 2). Hand pressed ( in ancient time) and then mechanical ones (fig.3), the precious mixture was pushed through a bronze die, by the Pastaio. Different Bronze die will produce many different pasta shapes that were then dried under the sun off the streets of Gragnano on bamboo canes (fig 4) caressed by the hug of the winds of Lattari Mautains and Sorrento gulf. The skill of the Pastaio completed the production with a careful and constant control on the drying Pasta.