Pasta Zara

Pasta Zara is an Italian dry pasta maker from Veneto, a family company of the Bragagnolo family. According to the official site, its story began in 1898, when Emanuele Bragagnolo, a building contractor in Castelfranco Veneto, visited a small pasta factory in southern Italy and decided to become a pasta maker. Back in the north he opened a small pasta factory in the centre of Galliera Veneta, Pastificio Bragagnolo. Twenty years later his son Umberto took over, turned it into an industrial business and moved the main site to Castelfranco Veneto. In 1932 Umberto opened a second plant in Zadar (Zara in Italian) in Dalmatia, named Pastificio Adriatico; during the Second World War it was lost and he returned to Castelfranco Veneto. In 1965 the main site moved to Riese Pio X and Franco Bragagnolo renamed the company Pasta Zara in memory of the events in Zara. Since 1997 it has been run by the fourth generation.

According to the product pages, the classic pasta is made from durum wheat semolina and water, and the egg tagliatelle from semolina, eggs and water; the wheat is grown in EU and non-EU countries and milled in Italy. The company says it uses pure spring water from the nearby Dolomites for all its lines and bronze-drawn dies for some of them. In the late 1990s and early 2000s the company opened further plants in northern Italy, and it says its pasta is distributed in 108 countries.

The range has six lines: Linea Classica (many shapes such as spaghetti, bucatini, linguine and penne rigate), Linea Integrale (wholegrain), Linea All'uovo (egg tagliatelle), Linea Biologica (organic), Linea Bio Integrale (organic wholegrain) and Linea Speciale (cannelloni, semolina lasagne and tagliatelle, tricolour fusilli, fidelini).