The "macaroni" mentioned in the well-known song about Yaakov (Yankee) Doodle and his famous trip to town has nothing at all to do with dried pasta.
In the 18th century, the word macaroni meant something else. Per Wikipedia, it "pejoratively referred to a person who exceeded the ordinary bounds of fashion in terms of clothes, fastidious eating and gambling." A fop, or a show-off, in other words.
The revolutionary war-era song, then, serves to mock the bumpkim-pretentions of the Americans in that he could "stick a feather in his hat" and imagine himself a "macaroni."
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