It's a nationwide favorite...pasta.

Many of those tastes of Italy start right here in North Dakota.

Tonight Ag. Reporter Sarah Gustin takes you to Carrington to show you how your noodle takes shape.

Before you can get this..

Those kernels have to go through this

(Tim Dodd / President and CEO) "On a per month basis we will do about 40 million pounds per month. Your talking about a thousand semi loads a month of pasta." 24 hours a day, seven days a week...Dakota Pasta Growers is keeping your family well fed

Dodd says in one year...more than 330 million pounds of pasta are produced in Carrington

(Tim Dodd / President and CEO) "We have a full range of packaging equipment from packing eight ounce bags and boxes, all the way up to 1-thousand pound cardboard totes." Making noodles isn't a quick and easy process

It takes 6 hours to dry spaghetti

The noodle starts at 30% moisture and ends at 12

3 1/2 hours if your drying macaroni

There are more than 100 shapes and sizes, but there are always the favorites

(Tim Dodd / President and CEO) "But still a majority of your pasta is spaghetti and macaroni and we are starting to see a large growth in penne rigate and rotini, but still I would say 60 percent of the market is probably, actually 80 % of the consumption is within 10 shapes of pasta." Dodd says the big players are spaghetti, angel hair, elbow macanori, shells, rotini, penne rigate, and egg noodles

Recently a few different colored noodles have been swinging their way into the market share. (Tim Dodd / President and CEO) "Out of your healthy pasta catergory which is probably approaching about 100 million pounds of pasta. Healthy pasta that incudes your whole wheats, whole grain, organics and fortified pasta. And Dreamfields would be in that category. Today on a national consumption we are representing about 10 percent of that market." Dodd says in one day they will package 100-thousand units of Dreamfields

The pasta is high in fiber and low in digestible carbs...making it a healthy, yet tasty switch

(Tim Dodd / President and CEO) "If you have ever tried it, it also has the traditional taste. Same taste, texture and color as regular pasta." There's always something new on the way

Dodd says they are working to fortify pasta with omega 3's, different fibers and mulit grains. He says they are hoping to introduce fortified pasta within the next 6 months

In Carrington for KX News, I am Sarah Gustin."


Tomorrow night tune in to find out how Dakota Pasta Growers plans to become an even big player in the noodle market and the impact the plant is having on the small town Carrington Community. watch the video | save this article / add to your favorites list