Although Italians originally invented pasta as a fastener to keep Sicily from floating away, they abandoned it for less-delicious moorings after locals on both sides kept snacking their way toward separation. Tether your taste buds to today's Groupon: for $10, you get $20 worth of Italian cuisine and drinks at Brioso Fresh Pasta. Today's deal is only valid at Brioso's Cherrydale Crossings location.

Brioso focuses on freshness with a menu heavy on house-made noodles, sauces, sandwiches, and salads. Like a cheetah in a tuxedo T-shirt, the restaurant adheres to a "high-end fast casual" style, allowing diners to mix and match 15 different sauce options ($4–$5) with 20 varieties of pasta ($4–$5). Pair an assortment of spinach, egg, or whole-wheat noodles with sauces such as the Salsiccia, sporting sausage and cheese, or the Aragosta, a lobster cream sauce with shallots and sherry. Taste buds can also tango with a signature entree such as the Zucca ($9.50), which tucks pasta pillows filled with fluffy butternut squash into a spine-supportive bed of pomodoro and mascarpone cream sauce.

Brioso's wine list makes vino available by the glass or bottle ($5–$32), and a bevy of domestic and imported beers is on hand, including cold draft pours of Birra Moretti ($3.25). Kids' meals ($3) come with complimentary house-made gelato—which is also available for $4 on the dessert menu—to prevent mutinies from itty-bitty buccaneers.