Blizzard Ravioli

What could be better.  I know, I know, I should have been editing that chapter or paring down my paper for the AERA conference, but it was such a lousy day out.  So, I did it.  I made ravioli.  I shouldn't say I though, because lucky  for me, I was not alone. Now, making ravioli is one of those all day tasks with many steps, but it is worth every minute of that effort to break into one of those pillows of heavenliness.  I've taken pictures of the process for many of the steps, so bear with me. 

If you've never made pasta, you should try it.  It is a very forgiving process. It also makes your heart feel good.  At least, it does mine.  I've got perfect tools for this, but you don't need tools as everything can, and often is done completely by hand.  If you don't have a stand mixer, you'll need to make pasta using the "Well Method."  The cookbook, The Essentials of Classical Italian Cooking is a wonderful resource for how exactly to make pasta.  There are also numberous websites that will walk you through the process.  Don't be daunted.  Jump in!  Make a day of it!  Kids love making pasta (adults do too).  And there is nothing like the taste of it.  I encourage you to try. I think you will be glad you did.

For today, I made two different types of sauces for the spinach and cheese filled ravioli.  I made a classical Italian all day meat sauce, and a marinara for my vegetarian friends.  I used chicken for the meatballs, as I happen to like them that way, and I also used turkey hot Italian sausages, but they're not even in the running with the pork sausage I get at Caputos in Chicago.  Oh well, can't complain when I live 2 hours away from my favorite grocery store.  Well, I guess I could, but it wouldn't do any good.  I learned to make the meat based sauce from my former father-in-law whose father had just immigrated from Southern Italy.  I don't know how authentic it is as unfortunately for  me, I've never made my trip of a lifetime to Italy.  But I can tell you that whomever eats it, loves it.  Everyone.  Every time. 

This recipe makes a huge pot of ravioli and meat sauce. If you do not want a huge pot of sauce, or if you don't have a huge pot, you can easily cut everything in half. I use my largest enameled cast iron dutch oven for this.  This recipe makes enough dough and filling for 80 2 1/2 inch square ravioli and can be easily modifed to meet your needs.  I like to plan to have 6 ravioli per person and these freeze perfectly well.

Italian Meat Sauce
1 lb. good Italian Sausage
1 1/2 lb. ground meat (I used hand ground chicken breast, but you can use any combination you like.  Sirloin and ground pork work well.)
3 slices of bread with a good crumb, torn into pieces
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup milk
2 small onoins, finely chopped (about 1 1/4 cups)
5 cloves garlic, ground finely
1/2 cup parsley
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
2 t. good dried Greek oregano (I like the kind you can buy still on the stalk)
1 pinch red pepper flakes
1 t. fennel, ground coursely (optional)
1 t. salt (or more to taste)
ground pepper
2 eggs
2 cups onions, chopped finely
4 cloves garlic, chopped finely
2 cups green pepper, chopped finely
12 oz. mushrooms, sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1 4 oz. can tomato paste
2 28 oz. cans tomato sauce (not the jarred stuff with spices, just your basic, good tomato sauce found in the tomato section of the grocery)
1 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes
28 oz. water
2 bay leaves
salt to taste

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350.  Make the meatballs first.   To do this, mix the bread up with the 2 milks.  Let it sit while you prepare the vegetables.  Add the chopped onion, garlic, parsley, cheese, spices and eggs to the soaked bread.  Carefully mix in your meat.  Make golfball sized meatballs and place them on an oiled cookie sheet.  Bake for about 30 minutes until they are fully cooked.  Set them aside.

While the meatballs are baking, (I bake them, by the way, because they are much less of a mess and I don't miss anything by doing this) Place 1 t. extra virgin olive oil in a dutch oven.  Brown the sausages on all sides and then remove them to a platter.  Saute the onions and peppers in the same pan, using them to clean off the "fond" from the bottom of the pan (fond is the term given to the sticky bits at the bottom of a pan leftover after sauteing or frying).  After about 4 minutes on medium, the vegetables should be somewhat limp.  Add the tomato paste and cook until it changes color and gets slightly darker.  This will take 4-5 minutes.  Add the mushrooms and garlic and cook another minute.  Add the canned tomato products, stir, then add the meats and their juices to the pan.  Add the water and the bay leaves and stir.  Let this cook on low, at a simmer for as many hours as you have patience for, but at least 4.  It is better at 6.  You may need to add water if it starts to get too thick for your liking.  Taste for salt at the end. I find the meats season the sauce well and usually do not add additional salt.

Marinara
3 T. good quality extra virgin olive oil
pinch red pepper flakes
1 1/2 cups finely chopped onions
4 cloves garlic, finely pasted
2 28 oz. cans good quality whole peeled tomatoes, crushed by hand or with an immersion blender
1 bay leaf
1 t. dried oregano
2 t. fresh thyme (or, instead of the herbs, use 1/4 cup torn basil)
salt to taste

Directions
Heat a dutch oven or heavy bottomed deep pot.  Add the oil. When it starts to shimmy, add the chiles.  Immediately add the onions and saute until deep golden brown.  Add the garlic and stir continuously for 1 minute.  Add the crushed tomatoes, bay leaves, and oregano (if using).  Let simmer for 30 minutes.  Add one cup of water and let simmer another 30 minutes. Finish with thyme (or basil) and salt to taste.  Today we added 1/2 teaspoon sugar to cut the acidity down. There was no hint of sweetness, but it did it's job.

Pasta
6 eggs
1/'4 cup water
1 t. salt
all purpose flour

Directions
If you have a large stand mixer, you may be able to do this full recipe in one batch. I have the Kitchen Aid Professional 600 and this was maximizing its capabilities.  Pasta can kill a mixer. I killed my mother's 1970's kitchen aid with just 4 eggs worth.  With all its protiens, it will work your machine, so if it seems to be struggling, cut your dough in half and make it two different times.  Add the eggs to the bowl of your mixer.  Mix with the paddle. Add the water and salt and mix for another minute.  Add the flour, one cup at a time, until your dough forms a stiff ball.  No, I can't tell you how much flour.  It depends on all sorts of factors, egg size, humidity, goddess will...Remove the paddle and put on the dough hook.  Knead at power level 2 for 5 minutes.  The dough will not be smooth like a bread dough at this point.  The real kneading happens with the pasta rollers.

Wrap your dough ball in plastic and let it rest for 1 hour.

Ravioli Filling
1 1/2 lbs. (24 oz.) good quality ricotta cheese
1 1/2 cups parmesan cheese (please do yourself a favor and use the good stuff here)
8 oz. frozen spinach, thawed, chopped and thoroughly squeezed out
1/'4 cup Italian flat leaf parsley, chopped finely
2 egg yolks
1/4 t. freshly ground nutmeg (please, throw out your pre-ground nutmeg!)
1/4 t. freshly ground pepper (same with the pepper)
salt to taste

Directions
Mix everything together in a bowl.

Directions for making the Ravioli
If you have rollers for your stand mixer, as I fortunately do, use them here.  If you have a hand crank machine, you'll want a friend to help you crank as you feed the dough into the rollers.  Start the machine on the widest setting (this means the rollers are as far apart as they go).  For me, this is #1.  Make a pile of flour on your countertop for dipping your dough to keep it from sticking to the rollers.  Cut your dough into about 2 inch pieces (you should do this one at a time, not all at once so that the remaining dough does not dry out).  Flatten the piece of dough and push it into a bed of flour that you have on your countertop. (This is going to get messy, but that's half the fun.)  Feed your dough into the rollers with one hand while the machine is running.  Don't worry.....  Don't worry.  Catch it with your other hand as it exits the rollers.

This is my friend Boone, catching the dough as it exits the rollers.  If you look closely in the window, you can see the snow coming down. 

Fold the pressed pasta sheet into thirds, like an envelope.  Rotate it so that the edge goes into the machine first.  Run it through again on #1 (or, the widest setting).  Do this until the dough is smooth.  If it gets sticky, dip it in the flour. If it tears, don't panic, just press it together, dip it in flour,  and start again.  It's forgiving, remember?

For me, and for this batch of dough, I did this 7 times for each piece.  Then, adjust your rollers to the next thinner setting (#2).  Flour the flattened but somewhat thick dough.  Run it through the machine once.  Do not fold.  Repeat this process for #3, 4, and finally 5.  I like my raviolis to not be too thick, so I go to #5.  Some recipes go even thinner, but I find that the filling part gets wrinkly when I do this.

Now, as you roll your dough more and more thinly, it will get longer and longer.  You'll need to just trust me.  Catch it as it exits the machine.

When you've run it through on #5, place it on a well floured flat surface.  Now, here's the best part.  You'll need your filling, a teaspoon, a pastry brush, a bowl of water, and a pastry or pizza cutter.  Place large marble sized mounds of filling (about 3/4 t.) 3/4 inches from the edge of the pasta sheet that is facing you, running lenghwise, with 1/2 inches in between mounds.  Next, brush a line of water (you don't need much) above and below the cheese mounds, almost touching them.  Then brush a bit of water in a line between each ravioli.  Next, carefully fold the dough over the mounds, matching edges to edges.  Now, here's the tricky part.  Don't fear it, just roll with it.  You'll get the hang of it, I promise.  Starting near the center of the sets of mounds, take your fingers and press down at the seam, then cup your hand around the mound, pressing out the air as you press the dough firmly down to make the sheets adhere to each other.

 Then move out from the center doing the same.  Try not to get any wrinkles, but honestly, they are inevitable, particularly at first.  Don't get discouraged if this happens.  They will still taste great.  Next use your pizza cutter to trim the bottom and to cut them apart from one another. 

Place on a cookie sheet that has been thoroughly covered with semolina or regular flour (semolina is duram wheat and is coarser than regular flour so it works well to keep the pasta from sticking to your pan, which is a disaster, trust me.  I've had that happen. And I cried.  But, I lived to make ravioli again and again.) Place the ravioli on the cookie sheet. Continue with the rest of the ravioli making in the same manner (it's nice to have friends so that the rolling and filling can happen at the same time.  Me, I had 2 friends.  Boone and Julian, who is 12, and is killer in the kitchen.)

Now you have some options. You can stick those cookie sheets on a freezing cold porch to freeze them (which works well in a blizzard), or just into the freezer if yours is not packed like mine.  You can then put them into bags and you can have amazing ravioli anytime.  Or, you can cook them.  To cook them, boil a large pot of water.  When it comes ot the boil, add a lot of salt so that it tastes like sea water.  Go ahead, taste it.  This will bring the water off the full rolling boil, which is good.  Carefully add your ravioli (depending on the pot, I wouldn't do more than 30 at a time).  Reduce your heat if the water starts to boil rapidly.  Gently boil the ravioli,  (don't freak out if a few break--sometimes they do.) stirring every minute or so, until they are tender, about 5 minutes (taste one, or a corner, to see if they are done to al dente.)

Serve with the lovely sauce of your choosing and a sprinkling of parmeggiano reggiano.

Buon Appetito!