Why You Should Stop Eating Spaghetti

Spaghetti and meatballs is supposed to be a classic dish. Why, then, is the experience of eating it the food equivalent to deep-sea diving with your eyes closed?

I know I'm "supposed" to twirl it, but the fickle strands just slide around the plate like masters of evasion. It's too thin to be fork-stabbed, too long to use a spoon, objectively idiotic to attempt eating with just a knife and too saucy to use your hands if you're above the age of two.

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And about that sauce—you can dump all the creamy Alfredo or old-school marinara on it that you want, but spaghetti doesn't hold onto anything. It's not ribbed for your pleasure. There's no textural sensation. The only time I've enjoyed myself with spaghetti was one time in fifth grade when we had to build structurally sound "bridges" using just Elmer's glue and spaghetti. Needless to say, no eating was involved.

Why settle for something as ineffective as spaghetti when there are so many other pasta shapes? It isn't rational to opt for slippery noodles over whimsical wheels, classy bow ties or teeny-tiny bowls whose name translates to "small ears" (stay perfect, orecchiette). Then there's Frito-shaped campanelle, which might as well be called Bolognese storage units. If I wanted to open a can of worms, I'd bring up politics.

My anger extends to angel-hair pasta, which is just spaghetti with less taste and more tangle. The shorter cooking time isn't even helpful; it's nothing but a shortcut to misery.

Maybe the real reason everyone's so busy spiralizing their vegetables is not because they're trying to replace carbs, but because they're going the exposure-therapy route. Good luck with that—I'll be busy with my rotini.