In durum wheat pasta, the ideal expected cooked weight is about three times heavier than the dry weight (Dick & Youngs, 1988; Doxastakis et al., 2007). The swelling index was the highest in LT and VD pasta. Samples dried at very high temperature had significantly lower swelling index compared to pasta dried at low temperature; however, they did not differ from the VD samples. The lowest swelling index was observed in fresh pasta, likely due to the shortest optimal cooking time. Water uptake was also higher in the LT and VD samples as compared to the VHT samples. All samples had significantly higher water uptake than the control pasta. Similar results were obtained by Zweifel (2001), who reported that pasta dried at a high temperature showed lower water uptake than pasta dried at a low temperature. During VHT drying, a stronger protein network might have been formed, which in turn could have led to decreased starch swelling, resulting in lower water uptake. The cooking yield of VD pasta (i.e. which had higher water uptake) might be related to the reduced-pressure drying process, because the rate of moisture transfer from core to surface is higher at lower pressures than it is at atmospheric pressure (Gunasekaran, 1999).