Can You Pasta Sauce Please?

As a kid we always have that one meal we look forward to eating, that one meal we beg our parents to make over and over again, the one meal that holds some sort of valuable meaning to you. It’s the type of meal you can’t get anywhere else; it’s a homemade meal made by someone you love. After living in a dorm room for two years and having to eat dining hall food everyday I have come to appreciate the value of a home cooked meal. It’s not just the taste but also the thought that is put into preparing the food that makes it special. Ravioli has pretty much been apart of my family ever since I was born. They are something my mom’s grandmother brought into our family and has been passed down over the generations. Growing up my grandmother as well as mother were the always the ones that made this meal, typically on holidays like Christmas. It’s a meal that beings a warm and cozy feeling when ever we have it. It’s a feeling of being home and safe, a feeling like no other. In a way, I feel that this meal has brought our family closer. It has a true meaning to us, it has become a tradition that will continue to  be passed down.

There are two parts to this meal, the sauce and the ravioli, which are both crafted with love. This process is usually done in advance and can usually take up to over several hours so patience is required. The first step, the sauce, is probably the most important step or so my mom thinks. As my mom once said “this isn’t the shit you buy in a jar, this is the real stuff” still holds true to this very day, there is a lot of love and hard work that goes into preparing this meal. The sauce is made by using six cans of crushed tomato’s, two cans of tomato paste, a couple garlic cloves, and some spices to top it all off. Taking all those ingredients we throw them into a big pot and let it cook at a low heat. Now no sauce is complete without meatballs, which brings us to our next task. The meatballs are made using hamburger, eggs, garlic powder, red pepper, parsley, and breadcrumbs. All these ingredients are put into a mixing stand and mixed all together. Once everything is fully mixed we take a little bits of the meat and roll them into balls. After the mixture is all gone and we have our meatballs we toss them onto a frying pan at medium heat and cook them until they are a nice light brown color. It is important you don’t over cook them since once they are added to the sauce they will be cooked more.

The next set in this meal is the ravioli; the most time consuming and takes the most effort. The simplest part to the ravioli recipe is making the dough. We use two cups of all-purpose flour, three large eggs, two tablespoons of olive oil, and a pinch of salt. Taking all the ingredients we place them into a mixing bowl and work it until a thick dough forms then taken out and kneaded for about ten minutes. Once the dough is kneaded to perfection we wrap it in plastic wrap and let it sit for thirty minutes. After the dough has sat it’s time to roll, literally. We break out the infamous ravioli maker and get to it. By this time I usually try to disappear since this is the worst, most tedious part of it all. We knead to get the dough and start splitting it into several sections about the size of a fist. If you’ve ever seen a ravioli maker it has three different rolling parts a flat one, a two with alternating stripes to make either thin or thick pasta. We wont to use the flat one to roll out the dough into nice long sheets. The dough is place into the flat roller and we then have to manually, yes manually, crank the handle to push it through the roller. This process is done about 5-6 times until the dough is a nice smooth sheet. The sheet is then placed on top of a ravioli mold and press. You mold the dough down and add some ricotta cheese in each of the pockets, then lay other sheet of dough on top of that and roll it with a rolling pin until the edges of the square are perforated. We then tear each ravioli and lay them out on some aluminum foil. This process is repeated over and over until all the ingredients have run out and we have all of our raviolis. Now that the worst part is over we usually set them in the freezer over night so they’re ready to cook for the next day.

Today is the day, the day I get to feast on my favorite meal, and it’s Christmas day. I wake up with the smell of sauce lingering it’s way upstairs to my bedroom. It’s the type of day that when you wake up you know it has to be a good day. As it get closer to the time to eat my mom puts on a big pot of water and waits for it to boil. Once the water has boiled she gently places the ravioli into the pot making sure that none of them are going to break or burst. She lets them cook for about seven minutes then takes them out one by one and places them on a platter. The sauce and meatballs are then added to the platter as well as a separate dish for those who are a like a little more sauce. We all sit down and await the delicious, mouthwatering food that’s been specially handcrafted for us. It’s the little things in life that we need to be grateful for. The hard work and love that goes into every second of a meal really pays off in the end result. It’s traditions like these that bring our family close. We are able to bond with each other as well as over food. What more could you ask for?

 

THE RECIPES

Sauce  
6-cans crushed tomatoes  
2-Tomato paste 6-Sausage  
Garlic cloves  
Cool on low all day

Meatballs
2 lbs Hamburger
1 egg
Garlic powder
Red pepper flakes
Parsley
Bread crumbs
Sauté meatballs 10 min on low then place on   sauce.

Ravioli dough
8 cups (leveled) flour
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups warm water
*kneed dough by hand until smooth and elastic - cover with  towel - let rest for 1 hour or more

Ricotta cheese filling
Ricotta cheese
1 tablespoon grated cheese
1 tablespoon freshly chopped parsley
1-2 eggs
salt & pepper
*use 1 teaspoon for each ravioli


Instructions on how to use pasta maker: