Stelline substitutes

Tiny round pasta beads of almost exactly the same size as stelline. The single best substitute and usually the easiest to find.

Best for

chicken broth, Italian wedding soup, kids' soup, minestrone

Cooks in the same six to eight minutes, thickens the broth to the same degree, and tastes identical, because it is the same semolina. The only loss is visual, and with a small child that can matter more than anything else on this page: beads are beads, and stars are the reason the soup gets eaten. Everything else about the bowl is the same.

Letters, tiny tubes, rings (anellini), grains of rice (risoni), or the generic bagged pastina sold in most Italian sections. All the same dough at the same scale.

Best for

kids' soup, chicken and broth, buttered pastina, Italian wedding soup

Functionally identical to stelline and just as fun on a spoon, which makes it the swap to reach for if the stars were for a child rather than for a recipe. Cook times vary by a minute or two between shapes, so taste rather than trust the box. Flat shapes such as letters clump together slightly more than stars do, so stir the pot in the first minute.

Very short tubes, roughly twice the size of stelline. The standard soup pasta in a lot of Italian-American cooking and always in stock.

Best for

minestrone, pasta e fagioli, chicken soup, Italian wedding soup

Because the pieces are bigger and hollow, they hold broth inside and eat as distinct chewy bites rather than dissolving into the spoonful the way stelline does. That makes the soup feel more substantial and less like a broth, which is often an improvement for adults and a problem for toddlers. Ditalini also sheds less starch per piece, so the broth stays thinner; if you want body, let it cook a minute or two longer.

Rice-shaped semolina pasta, about three times the size of stelline. Widely available and a good soup pasta in its own right.

Best for

chicken soup, lemon and egg soups, vegetable soup, brothy dishes for adults

Orzo is denser and chewier, so instead of the soft, almost porridge-like spoonful stelline gives you, the soup gets discrete grains with a firm bite, closer to a rice soup. It also releases a lot of starch, so a clear broth will turn cloudy and noticeably thicker; add a splash more stock. Takes 8 to 10 minutes rather than 6 to 8.

The cupboard answer, and a much better one than it sounds. Hold a small bundle of thin dried pasta over the pot and snap it repeatedly into short lengths.

Best for

chicken broth, any soup where stelline was the only pasta, improvising with no shopping trip

The pieces are short splinters rather than neat stars, so the mouthfeel is very close but the look is rustic. Thin pasta cooks fast, around three to four minutes, so add it near the end or it goes to mush and clouds the broth badly. This is also how sopa de fideo is made, which is a good sign that it works: broken thin pasta in broth is a real technique, not a compromise.

The least-good option, listed because many people have it and few realise how differently it behaves.

Best for

last resort, thick soups where a little body is wanted

Couscous is steamed semolina granules that swell fast and drink an enormous amount of liquid. Dropped into a soup it can turn a clear broth into a thick, slightly gluey mass within minutes, and it keeps absorbing as the pot sits. Use half as much as the recipe calls for in pasta, add it in the last two minutes only, and serve immediately. If the soup is meant to be brothy, skip this and use broken thin pasta instead.