Is pasta on the menu? If you are considering spaghetti and sauce, you may find yourself staring at the pot...waiting for the water to boil. It's best to bring the water to a boil first, right? And it's best to use the amount of water noted on the box, right?

What happens if you cook with less water?

What happens if you put the pasta in with the water at the start?

What happens if you use hot water rather than cold water?

What happens if you use a different kind of pasta?

These are all questions that a seemingly simple dinner of spaghetti can raise.

If you're feeding a crowd, take a look at this science project idea:

• The Pasta Puzzle: How Much Water is Required to Cook Pasta? (Science Buddies' difficulty level: 4)

Not only will this add a scientific boost to your dinner preparations, but you'll have built-in rapidly boiling dinner conversation full of gluten and just a bit al dente.

Twelve Pounds of Pasta?
If you're curious about the outcome of this experiment but can't justify making twelve batches of pasta all at once, set up your lab notebook to record your results and try a different approach over the next few pasta nights in your house.

Taste Test
The project recommends taste-testing to determine if the pasta is al dente. Throwing it against a wall to see if it sticks or not... is a recipe for a mess, not necessarily a formula for perfectly done pasta!