“Are you ready to order?” she asked Edward.
“Bella?” he asked. She turned unwillingly toward me.
I picked the first thing I saw on the menu. “Um…I’ll have the mushroom ravioli.”
“And you?” She turned back to him with a smile.
“Nothing for me,” he said. Of course not.
-Twilight, Stephanie Meyers
Bella Italia, located in Port Angeles, where Bella apparently has this mushroom ravioli dish, sold ~4,500 bowls of the dish in 2009. No surprise there. Port Angeles in Washington is a liiittle far for us to travel from Oz to try what Bella did, so we whipped up our own version at home. If you’re making the pasta from scratch, do this on a quiet weekend when you don’t have anything planned. Making pasta isn’t something you rush or try to make for your meal ‘right now’.
Think of this as kitchen therapy. Give up the mixer and take your time kneading the dough and the give in to the repetition of running the dough through the pasta press. Yes, the one you have hidden in the back of your cupboard.
- 1 egg
- ¾ cup flour
- If you're making gluten free pasta, you'll want a tiny bit of vegetable oil.
- 1 clove of garlic, crushed
- 100g goat's cheese (or try this with feta cheese)
- 1 cup button mushrooms, washed and sliced
- 55g/ 4 tbsp butter
- ¼ cup flour
- 2½ cups milk
- pinch of salt
- ¼ cup parmesan cheese
- pinch of nutmeg
- Make a well in the mound of flour and add the eggs.
- Mix the eggs and flour together with a fork until the mixture is no longer sticky and is dough like. At which point start to use your hands.
- Knead the dough for 10 minutes until it's smooth.
- Let the dough sit for 30 minutes.
- Take a quarter of the dough, wrap the rest in a damp tea towel or cling wrap, and roll it out with a rolling pin.
- Begin feeding it through the pasta press and continue feeding it through, bringing the machines numbers down each time, resting the pasta between 'feeds'.
- Once you've worked it down to the thickness you want, let it rest for 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile, make your mushroom ravioli filling and Béchamel sauce.
- In a frying pan, heat some olive oil and sautee the mushrooms and garlic together until soft. remove from heat and stir in the goat's cheese.
- In a saucepan over medium-high heat, melt butter, then add flour.
- Stir for 2 minutes, then slowly add in the milk and whisk until it has a smooth consistency.
- Continue to cook for ~10 minutes until it comes to a boil. Reduce heat, let simmer for several more minutes until sauce has thickened.
- Stir in the parmesan, salt and nutmeg.
- Heat a large saucepan with salted water.
- Lay out your dough, cut into squares about 3.5 by 3.5 cm.
- Spoon a bit of mushroom ravioli filling into the centre of one square, and seal the other square on top.
- Repeat until all pasta is ready to be cooked.
- By now the salted water should be boiling. Place the pasta in and let cook for 5 minutes. The pasta should rise to the top once finished. Spoon out with a slotted spoon to drain water, and place into serving bowls.
- Spoon béchamel sauce on top, some extra parmesan cheese and serve.
The post Twilight; Mushroom Ravioli in Creamy Besciamella Sauce appeared first on Food in Literature.
