Can Trendy Ingredients Make Pasta Appealing Again?

Chia Seeds, 'Ancient Grains,' Chickpeas Are Latest Attempts to Bring Back Americans' Noodle Appetite 

By Anne Marie Chaker                Sept. 24, 2014 6:50 p.m. ET

Pasta makers are throwing spaghetti at a wall to see what sticks with consumers.

Be it bow-shaped farfalle, fusilli spirals, angel hair wisps or straight-up
fettuccine, pasta is being infused with trendy ingredients like kamut wheat, corn
flour and chia seed. Once vilified, noodles now boast about their extra doses of
protein, vegetables and fiber.

The jury's out on whether more-adventurous varieties can help turn around the
flailing $1.9 billion pasta business, where sales have been limp as consumers
have shied away from wheat and carbohydrates in recent years. Sales for the
year that ended Aug. 10 were down 1%, according to IRI, a Chicago marketresearch
firm.

Ronzoni pasta has been trying to rekindle consumers' pasta romance with five
new lines introduced over the past three years—the most new pasta introductions in a decade, says Paul Galvani, senior vice president of marketing for New World Pasta, a unit of Spain's Ebro Foods.

Ronzoni Gluten Free is made of white rice, brown rice, corn and quinoa flours.
"Quinoa is a sexy word," Mr. Galvani says. Ronzoni 150 boasts 150 calories per
2-ounce serving. Ronzoni Garden Delight, enriched with carrot, tomato and
spinach, promises a half-serving of vegetables in 2 ounces of pasta.

The new pastas resonate with consumers in their 20s and 30s who are more
educated and affluent than average, and are either living alone or just starting a
family, Mr. Galvani says. Older generations, he says, tend to stick to a longtime
variety.

Pasta lost its allure in the early 2000s, as carb-cutting diets came into vogue.
Diners began eating burgers without the bun and leaving their linguine
untouched.

Gluten-free claims, along with other buzzwords like superfoods, Omega-3s and
antioxidants, have captivated careful grocery shoppers. "Gluten-free started
changing things in the pasta world," says Kara Nielsen, culinary director for
Sterling-Rice Group, a Boulder, Colo., food-consulting firm, as did the rise of
quinoa and "ancient grains." Sales of gluten-free pasta rose 43% in the year
ended Aug. 23, according to Nielsen NV.

Monique Deschaine, president of Al Dente Pasta, a Whitmore Lake, Mich.-based
pasta business she began with her husband 33 years ago, says dining in recent
years became stressful as more people shunned pasta. "I would sit there and
think, 'This is the end,'" Ms. Deschaine says. In 2012, the company launched a
pasta with chia seeds, a source of Omega-3 fatty acids, protein and fiber, as a
main ingredient. The BonaChia line—available as fettuccine or linguine—has
helped boost company sales 10.5% a year on average since then, compared with a
pre-chia average annual increase of 3.5%, she says.

Donna Downum, a retired nurse in Castle Rock, Colo., says she buys shelf-stable
packages of Miracle Noodle every few months to help maintain her weight. The
noodles are made from the root of the Asian konjac plant, which contains a type of starch with water-absorbing properties, called glucomannan, that results in a
noodle made mostly of water, says Kantha Shelke, principal at Corvus Blue, a
Chicago food-science research firm.

What's left is primarily fiber which isn't absorbed by the body, resulting in
negligible calories. A 3-ounce serving of Miracle Noodle-brand Spaghetti boasts
zero calories per serving and only 1 gram of carbohydrate. Chicago-based
NoOodle has a similar no-calorie profile. Dr. Shelke is a technical adviser to
NoOodle.

Some consumers say no-calorie noodles make weight-control easier. Ms.
Downum prepares Miracle Noodles with Asian-style stir-fried vegetables, or
heated up with jarred spaghetti sauce. "I like that they take on whatever flavors
you put them with," she says.

Others are less enthusiastic. Melissa Riches, a 45-year-old sales administrator
for a Los Angeles cosmetics company, recently tried Miracle Noodle with
spaghetti sauce. She says she cringed when she opened the bag because it
smelled like fish. And she felt nauseated after eating the noodles, she says.

Jonathan Carp, the company's president, says some consumers detect a faint
fishy smell upon opening the package, which is largely due to the konjac plant's
own natural smell. He expects to release a new version of the product next
spring, which he says will be "odor free." Any nausea, Dr. Carp adds, is "highly
unusual."

It isn't easy making a tasty non-wheat pasta, executives say. Many gluten-free
pastas boasting novel ingredients "taste like cardboard" says Dan Fogarty,
executive vice president of marketing for Noodles & Co., a Broomfield, Colo.-based restaurant chain. After customers began asking for gluten-free options, chefs and executives at the company tasted about a dozen different varieties before settling on one with corn and rice instead of wheat. They began serving it last year. "It doesn't taste corny," Mr. Fogarty says.
 

The new pastas leave behind another appealing ingredient in regular pasta—the
low price. Pastas labeled gluten-free cost $3.79 a pound on average, according to
Nielsen, compared with $1.41 for regular dry pasta.
 

Consumers intrigued by the new pasta varieties should still read labels closely,
nutritionists say. Barilla Plus spaghetti, which the company touts as "packed
with protein power," offers 10 grams of protein and 4 grams of fiber per 2-ounce
serving. Plain enriched spaghetti has about 7 grams of protein and 2 grams of
fiber, according to the U.S. Agriculture Department's National Nutrient
Database. For those nutrients, "it's not that much of a plus," says Barbara Davis,
director of medical and scientific affairs for PLT Health Solutions Inc., a food
ingredients company in Morristown, N.J.

Anne Rosales, a nutrition manager for Barilla Plus, says the protein, from
chickpeas and egg whites, is a complete protein, and 2 additional grams of fiber
"goes a long way" toward reaching the goal of 25 grams of fiber for someone
eating a 2,000-calorie-a-day diet.

Write to Anne Marie Chaker at anne-marie.chaker@wsj.com