Since I recently tried my hand at making pasta at home, making my own ravioli seemed to be the next logical step. I modified my pasta dough recipe, added more egg yolks just to enrich it. My choice of the pork sausage filling was one of convenience, there was sausage in my fridge. The brown butter & crispy sage was an idea I picked up from the French Laundry Cookbook.

Pasta Dough

• 200 grams “00″ flour sifted.
• 2 large eggs + two extra egg yolks.
• 1/2 teaspoon salt.

1. Form a large well on a clean work surface with the flour.
   
2. Beat eggs together then pour into the well.
3. Using a circular motion, slowly incorporate eggs into the flour until the mixture is thick. Push all the flour into the centre until all the flour is combined into a thick dough.
4. Clean work surface by scrapping of any unincorporated dough.
5. Lightly dust clean work surface with flour.
6. Knead the pasta dough for at least 15 minutes until it is soft & elastic.
   
7. Wrap the dough in cling film and let it rest for about an hour
8. Dust the work surface with a little flour, unwrap the pasta dough on to the work surface.
9. Using a rolling pin, gently roll out the pasta dough making quarter turns occasionally. Do this until you have a round dough with equal thickness of about 3 mm.
10. Roll out the round dough in one direction to about 1 mm. The dough should be translucent.
    

Raviolis

I used farmers choice pork sausages for my filling. With the sausages, i just took off the skins to get the sausage meat.

1. Cut the pasta dough into two sheets, the two sheets will make the top & bottoms of the raviolis.
2. Spoon the sausage meat on to the bottom pasta sheet.
   
3. Cover the bottom pasta sheet with the other pasta sheet, press pasta sheet down around sausage stuffing to shape the raviolis.
4. Cut the raviolis out using a round cookie cutter.
   
5. Place raviolis on lightly floured tray to dry for about 45 minutes in the refrigerator.

Crispy Sage

1. Separate sages leaves from sage sprigs.
2. In a small saucepan heat some vegetable oil till almost hot.
3. Fry sage leaves until crisp.

Brown Butter – Buerre Noisette

1. Melt some butter in a saucepan on gentle heat
2. Cook butter until it has hazelnut/brown colour & aroma.
3. Pass the butter through a fine strainer.
4. Season the brown butter with salt and a few drops of lemon juice.

Putting it all together

1. Cook the raviolis in a large pot of salted boiling water for 5 minutes. Strain off the raviolis.
2. Serve raviolis with the crispy sage and a drizzle of the brown butter

This was yummo, everything tasted well together…. I’m doing this again.

I made some pasta by hand in my kitchen recently, it was fun & easier than I thought it would be. The results of my hand-made effort tasted really good. I don’t know why I had not done this earlier, I think buying pasta off a supermarket shelf is just too easy.

One thing I learnt though is that a pasta machine would probably do a better & more consistent job of stretching the pasta. However you should trying doing it by hand just once for the sake of it.

With this basic pasta under my belt, I am going to try my hand at different pastas. I will probably will start with my favourite stuffed pastas, ravioli & tortellini.

Here is the recipe for the pasta dough.

You will need:

• 175 grams “00″ Flour sifted.
• 2 large eggs.
• 1/2 tsp salt.

1. Pour the sifted flour & salt onto a clean working surface, form a well large enough to accommodate the eggs.
2. Pour the eggs into the well.
3. Mix the eggs in the centre of the well, whilst keeping a ready hand outside the well to prevent eggs from overflowing.
4. Slowly incorporate the flour into the eggs.
5. When egg & flour mixture is thick, push all flour into the centre and gently mix until the dough has stiffened. Once dough cannot arbsorb any more flour. Scrape work surface clean.
6. Dust the work surface with a little flour, knead the dough with a steady firm motion.
7. Knead the dough until it is soft & elastic, this will take about 8 minutes.
8. Wrap the dough in cling film and let it rest for 45 minutes before stretching.

For the Pappardelle

1. Dust the work surface with a little flour, unwrap the pasta dough on to the work surface.
2. Using a rolling pin, gently roll out the pasta dough making quarter turns occasionally. Do this until you have a round dough with equal thickness of about 3 mm.
3. Roll out the round dough in one direction to about 1 mm. The dough should be translucent.
4. Fold the dough into thirds, cut lengthwise at about 1.5 cm intervals to make pappardelle.
5. Lay the pappardelle on a clean dry tea towel, let it dry for about 30 minutes before cooking it.

Assembly

• Prepare the pomodoro(tomato) sauce as per the recipe in this other post.
• In a large pot bring salted water to a rolling boil, then add the pappardelle & cook for 5 minutes. Drain the pappardelle.
• Add tomato sauce to the pappardelle and toss to coat.
• Serve with grated parmesan cheese & freshly ground black pepper.

Enjoy!