This simple cooking hack will take your pasta to the next level

If you are anything like us, pasta features pretty heavily on your dinner menu. The thing is; we have never quite managed to get it to taste just like it does in our favourite Italian restaurants. Until now. Enter a brilliant pasta cooking tip by celebrity chef Giada de Laurentiis. Laurentiis recently launched a collection of pasta essentials with American homeware store Williams Sonoma, and chatted all things pasta making with MyDomaine. When asked about her best tip for next level pasta, the celebrity chef answered: "First, always add enough salt to the pasta water. A lot of salt." Why, you might ask? Surely all this salt can't be good for us. But, if Laurentiis is to be believed, this part is pretty much essential. "The first place to season the pasta is in the water," she explains. " So you think you’re adding too much salt, but it’s never enough. You have to really flavor it." Once you have done that, TV chef and cookbook author also has another expert tip up her sleeve: "Second, I always finish the sauce with a little bit of pasta water, because that gluten and that stickiness are what bind the sauce. And third, I finish it with extra-virgin olive oil and freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano. Those are my three keys: pasta water, olive oil, Parmigiano-Reggiano. And then, if you have an extra minute, a little bit of lemon zest on top makes all the flavors and aromas pop." Now; who's for pasta for dinner?