Combine hot pasta directly with its sauce
Rinsing removes some starch from the pasta's surface and cools it down. Both effects are often unwanted in a hot dish. Clinging starch and some reserved cooking water help the pasta and sauce come together.
Prepare the sauce first, save some cooking water before draining and promptly add the drained pasta. Combine it according to the temperature sequence in your recipe. A tomato sauce may simmer briefly with the pasta, whereas pesto or a delicate cheese mixture needs different handling. Cold rinsing is not a necessary intermediate step.
Pasta salads use different cooling methods
Some recipes cool pasta by briefly rinsing it with cold drinking water. Others spread drained pasta on a clean shallow tray without rinsing, first tossing it with a little oil. Either sequence needs to suit the subsequent seasoning and storage of the salad.
If your complete recipe calls for rinsing, drain the pasta thoroughly afterwards. Remaining water would otherwise dilute the dressing. This does not create a general requirement to rinse every pasta salad. Follow a coherent method instead of combining isolated steps from different recipes.
Rinsing cannot repair overcooked pasta
Cold water can limit further cooking, but it cannot restore a structure that has already become too soft. Check doneness in good time, considering both the product and the intended dish. The required cooking time does not change merely because the finished meal will be a cold salad.
Oil and dressing cannot make overcooked pasta firm again either. If it will continue cooking in sauce or in the oven, account for that with a suitable complete recipe. Automatically shortening every packet time is no more reliable than automatically rinsing every batch with cold water.
Plan cooling and storage together
Prepare a cold pasta salad so that cooked pasta and perishable ingredients are cooled promptly. Leaving a large warm bowl on the worktop for a long time is not an effective cooling method. Shallow portions release heat more readily and make subsequent refrigeration easier.
Refrigerate prepared pasta or the finished salad at no more than 7 °C, preferably below 5 °C, and follow stricter ingredient instructions where applicable. Cold rinsing does not make the meal shelf-stable. For today's hot meal, omit that extra step and move directly from draining to finishing the dish.