Erm, it depends... by: Matt - Pasta Recipes Made Easy
Hi there, good question and not an easy one to answer without writing a book!
Generally speaking, pasta in Italy was traditionally a cheap food embraced by peasants, due to it being made from just durum wheat flour and water (see this recipe here).
This is the same approach in fact as Asian cultures use to make noodles. These simply vary in type depending upon the type of flour used (see this page for more info on that).
A more modern type of pasta is egg pasta, which uses general/all-purpose super-fine flour (called double zero/00/'doppia zero' in Italy) and egg instead of water. This is my personal favorite type of pasta.
There is a wonderful book on the history of Italian food available called Delizia, which is a fantastically engaging read. It includes lots of pasta info, including how it actually originated in the East, but was most heavily adopted in Italy. If interested, you'll find it on Amazon.com here.
