Oh No, The Duck Wants A Little Pasta Water Added To The Sauce

The Duck decided to try a new restaurant in his city tonight. He hadn't been out in a while and figured what better way to start fresh than by trying a new place on his first venture outdoors. 

The Duck had many options. There were so many restaurants that he hadn't been to. It was pretty safe to say there were more restaurants in the world than the Duck could conceivably visit in one lifetime. 

The Duck settled on checking out a new Italian restaurant in town. The Duck liked Italian food because he loved pasta. But sometimes loving something can get in the way of accurately judging it. So the Duck went to work reading up on pasta and pasta sauces. The Duck wanted to be as knowledgeable about pasta sauce as the Chef of the restaurant he would be dining at. 

(A cursory glance at the Chef's bio on the restaurant website notes that the Chef trained in some of the best kitchens in Italy for over 18 years) 

The Duck spent his morning of culinary education looking up articles on the internet about Italian cuisine. He read articles all day and considered himself an expert by noon. In his learning, the Duck found that the most important thing to do to pasta is to add a little bit of the water the pasta was cooked in directly to the sauce, that way the sauce sticks to the pasta a little easier. This seemed to the Duck to be the fundamental essence of Italian cuisine and he set off to the new restaurant armed with this culinary knowledge. 

The Duck made it to the restaurant, sat down, and ordered his meal. When his meal arrived the Duck inspected the dish and asked the waiter a very simple question:

"Did you add any pasta water to this dish?" 

The server, who had been trained in the best practices of this particular pasta dish let out a deep sigh. This wasn't the server’s first rodeo with this type of customer. The server even had a prepared answer to this question:

"Actually, signore, this dish is cooked all-in-one so the addition of pasta water would be unnecessary... Buon appetito." 

The Duck was absolutely stunned to be treated in such a rude and unacceptable manner. The Duck was an expert on Italian cuisine as of noon this very day and it was not right for anyone to speak to anyone, let alone there superior in culinary knowledge, the way the Duck had just been spoken to. 

"Hey," The Duck called out to the Server as they were walking away, "Take my advice and add a little pasta water to the sauce... It’s an important step in the sauce-making process."

The server rolled his eyes and picked up the plate to oblige the awful customer. The Duck did not like this, he did not like that his unassailable knowledge was being seemingly mocked, he began to shout:

"Who serves pasta sauce without first adding a little bit of the pasta water to the sauce? Were you born yesterday? Huh? You goober? You goon? I would like to see the Chef!"

This commotion brought the restaurant to a stand-still. The Chef even left the kitchen to see what it was all about. The Duck spotted the Chef and directed his ire at him:

"How are you a 3 Michelin Star chef and I know more about sauce from watching Guy Fieri cook in a diner than you do? You got an answer to that? Because I’m at a loss, to be quite honest."

The restaurant fell silent, the Server leaned over to the Chef and explained the problem. The Chef started laughing. The rest of the restaurant followed suit. 

The Duck, as usual, was not pleased. 

"You think this is a joke? You dingbats, are you joking at me? Do you think I am here to play with you? I deserve, nay, I have earned, the right to eat pasta that has a little bit of the pasta water ADDED TO IT!"

At this point, the Chef went to the back and brought out a ladle full of pasta water. He spooned it onto the dish so that this pasta now looked like a soup and had the server return it to the Duck. 

The Duck, now pleased, ate his pasta soup. 

"This is delicious," The Duck said, "You should have listened to me sooner, this ugly scene could have been avoided."

The rest of the restaurant walked away. They ignored the Duck for the rest of the night. The Chef, just to be sure tried the dish with a ladle of pasta water on it and it was disgusting. 

By all accounts, this is the end of the story. However, for the sake of completion and full transparency, I shall include the additional ramblings of the Duck here. These were all interspersed throughout the meal and continued until the Duck had left. For the sake of your sanity, however, I urge you not to read it. Move on. Go on with your lives.

What follows is a Duck's silly ramblings, which I've asked you not to read: 

"No, no, you can’t walk away just because you don’t have time for this! I’m a customer and I’m complaining! Hey, Mr. “Yes Chef,” or whatever your subordinates call you, I am telling you putting a little bit of the pasta water into the sauce makes it stick easier because I care about you. I mean, come on man! This is Grub Street 101. How can you even be in this business and not just casually, INSTINCTUALLY, throw a little bit of pasta water into the damn sauce? I mean this is like... I’m in a bizarro world right now being served by Chef 'Doesn't Know Anything At All About Nothing!' You know, I knew this place was a scam from the moment I walked in. Yeah! I never once thought to myself, okay maybe this guy knows more than me. Fine, maybe you simmer that sauce down, let the flavors intermingle and then you add a little bit of pasta water at the end to round it all out. But imagine my TITANIC surprise when I saw you come back with a plate of delicious and perfectly cooked elbow macaronis then you just dumped that sauce on them like you were a kid in a sandbox! You are a fraud, you are a hoax, you are a louse. You’re charging people, money, legal tender, and you don’t know the number one rule in making pasta sauce? And you think I’m supposed to just accept that? Pop and Andes Mint and leave? No pop. Ain’t happening. I need restitution I need it now! I'm eating my Andes mint and leaving now but that doesn't mean I'm doing it because you won. I'm doing it because I won. And You should know that! Okay, have a great day everyone, wonderful meal once we got that pasta water thing figured out. Bye, take care."