BUTTERNUT SQUASH RAVIOLI

A few weeks ago I had some friends over for a little prosecco and ravioli making! I had never made pasta before but figured if we followed the directions it would come out somewhat decent. I picked my friend Gwennie Belle up from the train station and off we went to purchase the pasta maker and ingredients with little Brian in tow.

We bought the classic, no frills, cheap one and it worked like a charm! 

 you can purchase it here for $36.00 and it comes with a spaghetti attachment. 

For the pasta ingredients, you will need: 

2 cups all purpose flour

3 large eggs, plus 1 for the egg wash

2 tablespoons of olive oil

1 tbs. salt

For the butternut squash:

butter

brown sugar

For the brown butter sage sauce:

4 tbl. butter

1 tbl, brown sugar

fresh sage to taste

First, we roasted the squash with a few pads of butter and some brown sugar for about 50 minutes, or until soft enough to scoop out. You want the texture to be like mashed potatoes.

While the squash was roasting we made the pasta. 

In my Kitchen Aid with the hook-like attachment I combined:

2 cups all-purpose flour,

1 teaspoon salt

3 large eggs

1 tablespoon of olive oil

Next I kneaded and folded the dough on my counter for about 10 minutes until it was somewhat elastic and smooth. I formed about a 2 inch thick ring out of the dough and covered the outside with 1 tablespoon of oil and wrapped it in plastic wrap to rest for about 30 minutes. The girls were playing with little Brian while I did this :) 

Then came the fun part. Once the dough had rested, Caroline and I (below) broke off pieces sizable enough to fit through the pasta maker and started making our sheets for the ravioli. You start at the highest level so your dough can easily pass through. On this particular machine, we started with level seven and continued passing it through to about level three until the sheets became nice and thin. 

We laid the sheets of pasta out on my counter. *Hint: Make sure you put flour down on your surface so the pasta doesn't stick. 

Even little Brian got in on the action! 

Once you have your sheets made, lightly brush them with an egg wash (one egg beaten with two tablespoons of water). This is your glue. 

Start making little balls with your butternut squash mash and make enough balls to line up along half of the sheet (you're going to fold the clean side over the balls to make the pouches).

for the mash: 

butternut squash scooped out

fresh parmesan cheese to taste

salt & pepper to taste

See what I mean about folding over the clean side? Once you do that you press down around your balls of squash and start cutting out your ravioli squares. I used a pie crinkle cutter but you could just use a knife.

To cook, simply place the ravioli in boiling water until they rise to the top (about 5-7 minutes). I served them with a brown butter sage sauce which is just browned butter, a little brown sugar and fresh sage, topped them with parmesan cheese and voila!