I took a gourmet cooking course when I was a young bride, bored all day waiting for DH to get home. I was't a quilter then. LOL. We were taught to bring enough water to cover the pasta, not drown it, to a boil, put in pasta, stir to separate. We made homemade pasta so it took a couple of minutes to cook. Pre packed pasta was cooked the same way, just took longer. Making homemade pasta is so easy, I haven't bought pre packaged hard pasta in years. Now that good fresh pasta is available to buy at the grocery store I buy that to save time.