Sunshine AND Raviolis

Balsamic Mushroom Raviolis with Brown Butter Sage Sauce

As I’ve mentioned before, my childhood was slightly eccentric.  Not in the Addams Family type of way, but more so in the scenario of “oh, this doesn’t happen at your house, too?”  Case in point, I ate homemade pasta more often than boxed well into elementary school.  Making pasta was also an “activity” as opposed to, say, sidewalk chalk or playing dress-up.  Spying a white and green Corel mixing bowl with a damp dishtowel hanging over it meant only one thing: there was pasta dough resting in that bowl, and within the hour, my six-year-old hands would be covered in flour, cranking out linguini with my mom and making sure each and every noodle was separated on a folding table in the living room.  Fast-forward to 2009, I picked the habit back up and created this rudimentary recipe in my tiny Harlem kitchen.  Trying any last-ditch efforts to save a relationship that was going up in flames, I winged it and surprised myself with the unusual balance of the two sauces.  The relationship thankfully didn’t last, but these raviolis did.

Serves 2

Ingredients

1 cup flour

4 egg yolks (reserve whites for another use)

1 tbsp olive oil

8 oz. cremini mushrooms, sliced

4 tbsp balsamic vinegar

3 tbsp butter, room temperature

1 sprig fresh sage

Directions

Pasta dough

• On a flat surface, pile the flour, making a well in the center.  Gently place yolks into the well.  Add a pinch of salt and a few drops of olive oil.

• Break yolks while stirring into the flour, until all of the flour is wet.  Knead mixture into a ball, constantly working it until very pliable and smooth.

• Cover with saran wrap or a damp dishtowel; set aside.

Filling

• In a small sauté pan, heat balsamic vinegar on medium low.  Add mushrooms, seasoning with salt and pepper.  If needed, splash more vinegar into the pan until all slices are coated and cooked, about three minutes.

• Drain mixture through a sieve or colander to cool.

Assembly

• Once dough has rested 20 minutes or longer, cut ball in half, and continue to work the dough on a lightly floured surface until the shapes become oval.  Using a crank machine, crank pasta though a couple of times until the sheets are paper thin.  If using a rolling pin, roll dough until the same desired effect.

• Now that you have two long, skinny sheets of pasta, lie one sheet on top of a lightly floured piece of parchment paper.  Spoon filling onto on of the sheets, placing a teaspoon of the mixture every few inches; leave enough room between spoonfuls so that they have a rim of pasta around them.

• Gently blot the remaining sheet of pasta with a wet paper towel; lie this sheet directly over the other one, wet side down.  Press out any air around the mounds.

• Using the rim of a juice glass, press rim firmly down over each mound, thus creating the raviolis.  Save scraps for another use (soup noodles, pasta dinner, etc).

Sauce and compilation

• Melt butter in same sauté pan over medium heat.  Season with salt and pepper, then add olive oil and sage leaves.  Fry leaves until they are crispy, remove and drain.

• Lower heat until butter begins to turn golden brown, then remove from heat.

• Once the raviolis have been added to a pot of boiling, salted water, watch until they begin to rise o the surface.  This means they are cooked; remove from water and place directly into brown butter sauce.  Turn heat back on to low, gently folding raviolis into the sauce.  You may add any remaining mushroom filling to the pan as well.

• Season with salt and pepper, then plate.  Shave a few pieces of pecorino on top.  Serve.