“The story that it was Marco Polo who imported noodles to Italy and thereby gave birth to the country’s pasta culture is the most pervasive myth in the history of Italian food.”
(Dickie 2008, p.48). And I was ready to give him all the credit, but I still shout his name in the swimming pool.
I doubt you’d import any actual noodles. It’s the method of manufacture that is the important secret of the noodle and the idea of how to make them requires no heavy lifting on a long trip home.
Marco Polo certainly seems to have been the type of observer who’d make a note of that detail so even if he didn’t bring actual noodles back to Italy, I’m gonna believe and give him credit for his contribution to my favorite food.
Way to go, Polo, way to go!