It’s a space that’s been conquered by salad bars, burrito chains, bakeries, and burger joints. And yet pasta remains a white whale in the ocean of fast-casual dining. The absence of a large fast-casual Italian food chain is more an issue of complication than choice. To be sure, the fast-casual segment of restaurants remains popular among consumers. Interest is high enough that major chains increased the number of restaurants they operated by 7% in 2016, compared to the prior year. And since 2007, fast-casual has grown by more than 80%, according to The NPD Group, an industry tracker.

So what is it about Italian food that has eluded the fast-casual market? According to a recent deep dive by Eater, it has everything to do with food texture and the decades-old branding American-style Italian food has cultivated. There’s a reason Olive Garden’s tagline is, “When you’re here, you’re family.” Italian cuisine has long been emblematic of the tradition of gathering around a table and breaking bread with friends and relatives. That idea isn’t exactly transferrable to a model that has people racing through a cafeteria-style, choose-your-topping line before scurrying back to work to inhale their food at a desk.