Love ravioli!

Beef short ribs?  Yes, the meat is a key ingredients in my ravioli.  I begin by  braising the short ribs. I always put a good sear on my meats and sauté a mirepoix of carrots, celery, and onions.  I usually use a ratio of  three large carrots, two stalks of celery, and one whole onion

The best thing about braising?  Your time is your own.  I allowed these ribs (approximately a pound) to cook about a three hours in a liquid of of red wine and coffee.  I then separated the ribs, mirepoix, and liquid and allowed wach component to cool.  In the the time it took for the to cool, I made the cheese, (see earlier blogs for this process) and the pasta dough.  I simmered six cloves of garlic in one cup of organic olive oil and added that to one can of San Marzano tomatoes that were puréed with the   braising liquid  for a lucious, silky tomato sauce.

 

The pasta dough that I used and the cheese recipe are in earlier post; scroll through the blog if you  are interested in seeing them.  When I make the ravioli, I rolll the the dough by hand; not using the pasta roller, and use a biscuit cutter to make perfect rounds.

I cool and chop the beef before adding to the cheese in the ravioli, and since these are usually made with left over beef, it is not a problem. If you are doing this same day, cool the meat.  The last thing you want to do is add hot ingredients to cold and then try to freeze. It can also be dangerous.  Use an egg wash on the ravs to seal help seal them.  I made mezza luna shaped ravs.

And here is the end product:

I froze these to be sure they will cook from frozen (an earlier blog refers to the debacle of gnocchi!). I do not recommend these as a week night meal.  I literally spent all day cooking.  I usually use left over short rib meat for these, make the ravs and then freeze them for future use.  The a availability  of product at the market drove my crazy cooking desire to make them on a weekday.  Freezing the ravs when I make them on the weekend makes it easy to throw together a quick meal.  I often serve these with a sage brown butter.  Ravs can be made in advance and the fillings are endless; Swiss chard, or spinach sautéed with garlic;  venison sausage; or just a cheese mixture.  They are easy to make in batches and easy to freeze.  

The ribs were purchased at the Cooperstown Farmers' Market from Raindance farms, the carrots and garlic from Heller's Farm, the duck eggs (for the pasta) from Nectar Orchard