Dough made with a grain, with our without a raising agent, baked or fried.

After the infamous events of The Council of Bread-based Cakes, modern interpretations of The Carb Question avoid the potential for violence by only considering savoury usages of bread. It is now part of the Laws of The Question that you must disregard sweet bread-based dishes when making your choice.

Made from any unleavened dough (including those made from Rice) usually boiled. Comes in a long-ish shape or thin tube. Almost always used in cuisine originating in Asia.

Confusion abounds about terminology (Americans insist on referring to Spaghetti as Noodles) and The Great Schism - with Pasta forming a breakaway option - only adds to Noodles' image as a nexus for confrontation in The Question. Following the CCP (Common Question Parameters) guidance, Noodles is used to represent primarily east Asian cuisine offerings in ranking decisions, rather than in the etymological sense. Pasta must not be considered when voting for Noodles. See below.

To classify as Pasta, food should originate from Italy or its surrounds and should almost always be created (traditionally) with durum wheat. Spaghetti is a pasta, not a noodle. See below.

Pasta is famously the root cause of much contention in The Community. Today, The Carb Question is almost excusively posed using the Balham Derivation, which completely differentiates Italian-style Pasta from noodles in The Question. Historically of course this was seen by players from both Asia and The Americas as symptomatic of European Hegemony, but since the summit at Balham has been simply been recognised as being part of a fun game where everyone needs to chill the fuck out.

Potato is traditionally more straightforward and easy to grasp as a choice, even for complete newcomers to The Question. A bottom-up movement of potato fans in 2018 - known as The Findon Spuds - led to a groundswell of public opinion to begin allowing Sweet Potato when considering Potato as a ranking choice.

Since Sweet Potato's semi-official inclusion into this contender, more and more literature has been produced lobbying for the expansion of the Potato Contender to include other starchy tuberous vegetables such as Yams and even Turnips. However, such lobbying is strictly unofficial and while governmental bodies tolerate it, only Potato- and Sweet Potato-based dishes must be considered.

If you need rice explained to you, then The Question may not be a suitable pursuit.

Similarly to bread, Rice comes with its own set of controversies and historical issues. Since the era of politically motivated violence around whether or not to include sweet foods in The Carb Question is thankfully behind us, modern versions of the The Question consider only savoury foods - side-stepping the issue of, for example, whether rice pudding should form part of a judgement on Rice's official ranking. Thoughts and Prayers to all who lost their lives during those tumultuous years.