Thanksgiving 2009: Butternut Squash Ravioli with Crispy Sage Brown Butter

Here's my absolute favorite from Thanksgiving this year -- butternut squash ravioli from Emeril Lagassee. Man he is on it for Thanksgiving; the turkey brine I've been using for years is his too. This pasta is simply delicious.

It's funny because this was made after Thanksgiving; we made it Friday night. I had leftover filling and it was so good, I made it again this weekend (the above pic). I'm still working on shaping the ravioli. I also need to get it in my head that I need a lot of pasta and space for this. Yes, I'm a student of Alton Brown. I remember the episiode when he made ravioli on an ironing board. Mine isn't that clean!

So, it all starts with butternut squash puree. This was simple, I roasted the squash and sweet potatoes for my pie together. Y'all know I'm anti-boiling whenever possible. The oven really intensifies flavors whereas boiling washes them away. After roasting, just store the squash flesh in a plastic bag.

This recipe is really easy. Add the squash and mascarpone cheese to the bowl of your stand mixer. Yep, Old Faithful is doing it big for another Thanksgiving. Season with salt (kosher please) and pepper (freshly ground).

Emeril and I rarely disagree, but here's where I had to improvise. The filling was a bit bland. I ended up doubling the amount of cheese and adding nutmeg.

Let's turn to the pasta, shall we? I've made pasta before. This time I was sharing the magic of it with a seven-year old, Livvy. After I pulled the dough together, it was time for her to rock and roll. By this time, she was right at home in the kitchen.

Here's the beautiful dough. Doesn't that just beg for hot salted water and a drizzle of olive oil?

Let the transformation begin!

This is the only pic I have of Livvy making the pasta, but trust me -- she was all in the mix. After she rolled the sheets, we got busy applying the filling.

Once we got the ravioli filled and cut, We (I) headed to hot salted boiling water. I'm still loving my All-Clad pasta pentola. (Alas, I don't think Santa is brining me any All-Clad this year since I'm not spending my free time selling stuff at Williams-Sonoma this holiday season. I miss that discount!) You know the rules; when pasta floats, it's done.

Drizzle the pasta with a little olive oil and let it hang out while you tackle the brown butter.

Told you I need to work on cutting the ravioli. Livvy did a wonderful job crimping the edges, only one piece wasn't sealed properly. It just kind of hung out at the bottom of the pot.

I didn't read the instructions for the brown butter, but I knew it had butter and sage! The solids are just starting to darken in this shot.

Once it was plated, add roasted pecans. I added rosemary too. 'Twas tasty!

Tools of the trade

• Kitchen Aid Stand Mixer
• Kitchen Aid Pasta Roller Attachment
• All-Clad Pasta Pentola
• All Clad 10" Fry Pan
• WMF Spider
• Glass Mixing Bowl

I've Been Holding Out

Although the camera had been broken for months, I just threw it away a couple of weeks ago. I was smart enough to take the memory card out of the camera before tossing it. (My brilliance comes in spurts.) On the card, I found pics from the best thing I've ever made in my life - sticky buns. No joke. After I pulled them out of the oven Easter morning, I had fleeting thoughts of not going to church. These quickly passed after I realized I could eat another one in the car.

The recipe is from Baking Illustrated. The recipe was time-consuming and tedious, but I promise it was worth every caramel-oozing bite. ... I just had to pause and gather myself.

Again this recipe is long. Apparently I didn't capture all of the steps. I'm going with brevity here so I can get to the finished product. Start by mixing the dough. The dough is a combination of milk, butter, water, yeast, sugar, eggs and flour.

I know this doesn't look attractive, but keep reading.

The above needs a two-hour rise. While the yeast are doing their thing, move on to the caramel sauce. It looks like I made a recipe detour here. These pics are not the makings of the carmel sauce as directed in the recipe. I was also experimenting with caramel cakes around this time, so I must've found a recipe I liked better. I wonder where that is now ... I digress.

 Happy! Happy! Joy ! Joy!! Pour all that lusciousness into a greased 9x13 baking dish.

 I know that's a really bad shot. Remember, I do have a new camera now. Anyhoo, why don't we just cover all the caramel with some toasted and roughly-chopped pecans. This is getting better.

I was so tempted to stand over that pan with a spoon and work it out. Back to the dough. I managed to contain myself and roll the dough out into a rectangle.

Well, that's sort of a rectangle. Now, slather the wonderful butter, sugar, cardamom (yep cardamom) and cinnamon filling all over the dough.

 Roll it and cut it. Unflavored dental floss was the cutting tool.

 Get your cute little buns ;-) into the pan.

 I parked these in the refrigerator overnight. I let them do the final rise Easter morning.

  Thirty minutes of hot oven time later, you get this:

Now, that might not look all that spectacular to you, but just you wait. Honey, flip that pan and you get this!

Break them apart and you get this!

 

I heard angels sing ...

 Tools of the Trade

• KitchenAid Stand Mixer
• French rolling pin
• Pyrex baking dish
• All-Clad 3-qt saucepan

For the Foodies

A friend came over the other night and mentioned the Disarono and blue cheese pairing she had at a local festival. Well I had artisanal blue cheese and Disarono. Why not recreate? You'll need tasting or appetizer spoons to pull this off. It's amazingly simple.

Place a good bite of blue cheese onto to spoon. Use another spoon to add about a teaspoon of amaretto. I also added strawberries and pecans to round out the plate.

Cool, huh?

Tools of the trade:

• Crate & Barrel Appetizer Spoons

Quickly Impressive

I have a love-hate relationship with salad. I love to buy the pricey ones at restaurants. I hate it when for weeks on end I buy salad greens only to let them rot in the refrigerator. I don't know what it is, but I have the best of intentions when I buy salad greens, but my good intentions rarely lead me to refrigerator to make a salad before the greens go bad.

I've done better this last time around. The greens were in the crisper for a week before I made my first salad and they hadn't gone bad! Now when I'm in the mood to make a salad, I have a couple of killer ones. One is apple and bacon, the other is citrus. I'm working my way up to a fennel version. I also have one I learned to make salad with halloumi and grapes, but that's another post. Salad is really simple, but in a flash can be a real show stopper. This is the bacon apple salad.

Wash and spin dry your greens. If you are the epitome of lazy like me, grab a few handfuls of greens rinse them and blot with paper towels. A note on salad greens: I hate iceberg lettuce, unless I'm at a steak house and someone has drowned it in blue cheese. I prefer the dark greens, which are actually better for you. I get down on watercress, baby spinach and baby arugula too. Baby arugula is my favorite. I love its peppery bite. Oh yeah. I like Bibb lettuce too.

I digress. You'll need a crisp apple. For salad, I tend to go for any variety other than Red Delicious, Golden Delicious and Granny Smith. Grab some pecans, dried cranberries, fresh parsley, fresh mint and blue cheese.

A couple of slices of cooked bacon would be nice too. This is turkey bacon.

Let's make the dressing. I don't measure anything. I use the mini bowl in Miracle. Throw in a little Dijon mustard (it makes the dressing creamy so you don't have to use so much oil.) Honey, salt, pepper and cider vinegar round out the party. I really, really wished I had a shallot, but no luck. I don't like garlic with this salad.

Take everything for a spin. Once everything is well mixed, leave the food processor running and drizzle in the oil. You can see when you've added enough oil because the dressing will be creamy. The ratio for acid to oil is 3:1, but you can cheat this because of the mustard and honey.

Now, get ready for assembly. I really like this salad in layers. Finely chop the parsley and mint. I have braces, so I have to chop the pecans too. Chop the bacon.

Dress the greens. I keep it simple. I pile the greens on a plate and add a couple of tablespoons of dressing. I mix it up with my hands. I sprinkle the chopped herbs next. The dressing helps the herbs stick. For some reason, I like the herbs in the salad instead of in the salad dressing. Sprinkle on the dried cranberries and blue cheese.

Slice the apple and arrange it on the salad. I know mine is not quite neat. If you have any apple left over, rub the cut side with the salad dressing or cider vinegar and wrap in plastic wrap. Top the salad with bacon and pecans. Drizzle with extra salad dressing.

Yum! Yum!

Tools of the trade:

• Oxo Salad Spinner
• Shun Sankoku
• Totally Bamboo Butcher Block
• KitchenAid Food Processor