Anonymous wrote:I don't know if I "whip" it, but I usually add some reserved pasta water to these kinds of drier sauces. For example, if I'm doing pesto, I put the pesto in a bowl and add some pasta water and stir it up before I add the cooked pasta. Coats better. And if I've got the pasta in the pot with oil/butter and it looks dry, I add some pasta water.

I'm Italian. I didn't realize this was a secret

bakersman wrote:I have read the article three times and I can't tell if he is saying stir the pasta while in the water, before adding it to the sauce, or he is saying add the pasta to the sauce and stir it in the sauce.

What I have always done is to use tongs to remove the pasta (which is cooked to just before al dente) from the boiling into a pot with sauce, which adds water at the same time, and then stir the pasta in the sauce. The pasta finished cooking in the sauce and absorbs some of the sauce. The starchy water helps thicken the sauce. For a nice gloss and rich flavor, add a bit of butter to the tomato sauce. We also freeze the rinds from parmigiana/Romano cheese and then add those to our sauce.