The pasta drying process was studied using an engineering approach. The phenomena of mass and heat exchange between pasta samples and air was modelled according to the classic transport approach applied to a hollow cylindrical shape pasta. Data from the literature and from measurements were used to fix the material parameter values of both the air and dough phases. Theoretical correlations were used to obtain a good estimate of mass and heat exchange coefficients between dough samples and air. The proposed model was set by choosing the mass transfer coefficient as the unique optimisation parameter, determined by best fitting of the experimental water content data obtained under given conditions in a static dryer. The model was then validated at different temperature and air humidity drying profiles and a good agreement with the experimental results was found. Finally the model was applied to different process conditions and the drying time was calculated from the simulations. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.