Serves 4-6
Filling
225g beetroot, skins left on, washed and trimmed
125g ricotta cheese
20g Parmesan cheese, grated
a grating of nutmeg
½ teaspoon flaked sea salt, plus extra for salting the water
black pepper
Pasta
300g '00' flour
100g fine semolina, plus extra
for dusting
3 medium free-range eggs
about 6 free-range egg yolks
To finish
50g butter
12 sage leaves
Parmesan cheese, for grating
Making ravioli is not a big deal; it's fun. Don't worry if you muck up a few — just rescue the stuffing and have another go. You cannot help but feel a sense of achievement when you stare down lovingly at your work. This is my favourite filling, for the showy colour as well as the taste of fresh beetroot.
You can add juice to the pasta dough for drama but, once cooked, the colour will fade, so despite the picture, I have left it out of the recipe.
Submerge all the beetroot, with their skins on, in cold water and bring to the boil (removing the skins before cooking will result in a lot of flavour and colour being lost). Boil them, lid on, for approximately 30-40 minutes, depending on whether you are cooking one large beetroot or a couple of smaller ones. You may need to top up the water. The beetroots are done when a knife slides into them easily. Take them out of the hot water and allow to cool.
Put the ricotta in a clean J Cloth and gently squeeze out most of the water —
it does not need to be strangled dry. Put it in a bowl with the Parmesan, nutmeg, salt and a good grinding of black pepper. When the beetroot is cool, grate it finely into a sieve so that any excess water drains away, then mix it with the rest of the ravioli filling. Taste and alter the seasoning if necessary. Cover the filling and put it in the fridge to firm up a bit.
To make the pasta, put the flour and semolina into the food processor followed by the whole eggs. Hit go, blending the ingredients together. Drop
in four of the additional egg yolks, one by one, as you might not need them all. When the crumb-like mixture starts to ball, it is ready. It should be nice and pliable, with a faintly tacky feel; a little too sticky is better than too dry. Add the remaining yolks if you need to. Remove the dough from the processor and gently knead it for a minute or so on the work surface. Form it into a ball, wrap it in clingfilm and put it in the fridge for an hour.
Set up your pasta machine on the side of the table. Make sure you have a good length of work surface free to lay the pasta along and scatter this lightly with semolina. Unwrap the pasta and cut it into three pieces. Starting with the rollers on their most open setting, wind a piece of the pasta through the machine. If the pasta sticks to the rollers, dust the pasta with a little flour. Fold the pasta in half lengthways, put the setting down two notches and wind the pasta through again, folded-end first, as this will force air bubbles out of the open end. Fold the pasta in half and reduce the setting again. (The point of the folding is to get a good width on the pasta as well as length; the pasta should be as wide as the rollers by the time you finish.) Continue the rolling with an ever-decreasing opening on the rollers until the pasta goes through the finest setting. If the pasta rips on the narrower settings, check the rollers to make sure they have not got any dried old pasta on them — or rust, for that matter. You are now ready to make the first batch of ravioli.
Lay out the pasta sheet on the work surface. Again, there should be a scattering of semolina under the pasta — it would be a shame for it to stick when it came to lifting and closing the ravioli. Starting two-fingers' width in from one end of the pasta, put a teaspoon of the filling just below an imaginary
horizontal central line. Place the ravioli filling at two-fingers'-width intervals all the way along, remembering to leave the same two-finger gap
at the other end too.
Put some water into a little bowl; this is your glue. Paint along the entire length of the pasta edge closest to you. Then paint down both sides of each filling ball, starting just above the central line. Very carefully fold the top edge of the pasta over to meet the bottom edge. Gently pull the side of your hand down between the fillings to stick the folded sheet together, then use a knife to cut down the centre of the gaps. Pick up each ravioli piece and press the open sides together, starting from one side and pinching your way around the square to close it and chase the air out of the final corner; sealing the edges willy-nilly will only trap air inside, resulting in burst ravioli. They must be firmly sealed; try hard not to trap the filling in the edges, as this will also result in blow-outs when cooking. Repeat this process with the other pieces of dough until all the ravioli are made.
Lay the ravioli on a tray covered in a good amount of semolina to prevent them from sticking. If preparing them in advance, they must not be stacked and only put clingfilm over them if the tray sides keep it off the surface of the pasta dough.
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil. Meanwhile, melt the butter in a frying pan. When it is foaming, add the sage leaves and gently fry them on both sides until crisp but not browned (about 2 minutes). By this time, the butter will have gone a nutty brown; this is perfect — it should not be black.
While the sage cooks, turn the boiling water down to a healthy simmer (the pasta should not be bumping around like a sheet in a strong gale), drop the ravioli into the water and cook for 4-6 minutes. If you want to test one, cut off a corner of the pasta and nibble it; it should not be soft like canned spaghetti — soft, certainly, but retaining the faintest bite.
Divide the ravioli between bowls and spoon over the sage butter, finishing this plate of joy with a grating of Parmesan.
Extract from Valentine Warner's book The Good Table (Mitchell Beazley, £25.00).
More recipes: Valentine Warner's pickled onion, steak and ale pudding and iced orange loaf.
