I had a lot of fun in the kitchen on Sunday afternoon trying out my new pasta machine for the first time, and I was quite happy with my first time effort too, I made Ravioli with a Tomato and Basil sauce.
My first effort was aided by a pasta class I attended last week with my son Michael, neither of us had made fresh pasta before and I think we both come away thinking that was a lot easier than initially thought. The class itself was promoted as being a 2 and a half hour class, Mike had to leave early as he was going to the footy, he left an hour later than he expected, I left another hour and a half later. The class was fun, but the food was amazingly good, all made with the freshest ingredients and oh so tasty, I just about rolled out the door!
Anyway back to my first home grown effort, I made the dough just as I had been shown how to, but found the mix a little dry and put it down to using eggs out of the fridge instead of at room temperature, no matter a tablespoon of water was enough to get the dough to the desired texture before bagging it and leaving to rest.
Once I started kneading the dough with the rollers a little latter in the day, I was thinking this is rubbish, it was all out of shape and broke up a little, but I persisted and before I knew it I had this beautiful sheet of consistent dough, and I knew I was going to get a result. I then started decreasing the width f the rollers and vol-la I had made my first usable sheet of pasta, what a great feeling that was!
I had decided to make Ravioli whilst the dough was resting, which meant a quick drive to Ossie Park was in order to pick up a mould and a few ingredients for both the stuffing and the sauce, this was where I found the next hurdle, the guy at the shop thought he had the last kilo of beef mince in the country and wanted a Kings Ransom for it, I went around the hurdle and bought a couple of Italian sausages instead, they worked out even better than I had hoped for, Delish!
The sauce was simply made from onion, garlic, basil and tomatoes cooked slowly over a low heat until completely broken down, so easy yet very tasty.
I absolutely loved this afternoon of cooking, and look forward to making my next home made pasta dish, ciao Jack
As tasty as the ravioli was - I thoroughly enjoyed watching the transformation take place throughout the whole process. So exciting, I couldn't wait to taste the final result and I certainly was not disappointed! Yes, I have my list of must have pasta dishes for you to make!'Love Jo xx
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