Italian Grandma's Ravioli

October 15, 2022

This dish is 10 years in the making...meaning we've been searching for the recipe for my husband's favorite childhood food memory. His Italian grandma used to make meat filled pierogi's and he remembers her making the dough by hand, rolling it out, taking a piece in her hand, adding a scoop of a soft finely minced meat mixture, adding it on top of the dough, and then she would fold the dough over in the palm of her hand and squeeze the edges closed with her fingers. He recalls her repeateing this motion over and over. It's one of his most vivid memories of his grandma who passed when he was a young boy. I can't tell you how many times I heard him asking his mom for the recipe, determined she could find it, only to hear she had no idea if the recipe had ever been written down. His grandma had learnt it from her mom, and the recipe had been passed down by example.

But miracles do happen! On a recent trip that his mom took to visit his aunt, the written recipe surfaced, and so I made it. He swears it tastes exactly like what his grandma used to make. The only difference was that I cut it into ravioli instead of hand squeezing the dough into pierogis. But know I know for next time!

Here's the recipe:

Meat Filling

Losely mix the following and then pass through the small holed attachment of a meat grinder (I used my Kitchen Aid mixer meat-grinder attachment)

• 1 1/4 lb round steak, ground (I ground it myself)

• 1/4 lb ground veal

• 1 small onion, chopped

• 1 cup roughly chopped spinach

• 1/4 cup (loosely packed) chopped parsley

• 1 clove of garlic, roughly chopped

• A few pinches each of ground nutmeg, ground cinnamon, & ground cloves

Keep the meat mixture loose after it's ground together, don't press it. Drop it into a warmed skillet on top of 1/3 cup of butter that has been melted over medium heat. Cook this mixture over low-medium heat for 30mn. Let cool for at least 30mn. Then add in:

• 1/3 cup fresh fine-grated parmesan

• 1/2 cup breadcrumbs from italian bread

• 2 eggs, beaten

Pierogi Dough

While the meat mixture is cooling above, make the pasta dough:

• Boil 1 cup of water with a dash of salt

• Add 1 cup of flour and mix

• Add 2 beaten eggs and mix

• Add 2 1/2 more cups of flour (3 1/2 cups total for the recipe) and mix

Let the dough rest for 30mn

Roll out the dough...it should be thin but not transparent...about a 4 on a sheet pasta roller attachment. Cut circles or rectangles and place in the palm of your hand. Squeeze a bit of meat and place over half the dough. Fold the other half of the dough piece over the meat and crimp all the edges with your fingers.

Boil a big pot of salted water and drop pierogis in, a few at a time. They will raise to the surface after a few minutes. This means they are done. Remove them with a spider-spoon and place on a paper towel to drain. Continue to cook in batches.

To plate, you will need a large pile of fresh, finely grated parmesan.

• Put a few pierogis in a wide shallow bowl

• Sprinkle parmesagn over top

• Drizzle with melted butter, browned slowly with fresh sage leaves...the sage leaves will be crispy but not overly browned.

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After making these, my husband let me know that to replicate his grandma's ravioli even more closely, the raviolis should be fist sized, and not intentionally cut or shapedin smaller lovely "packets." They should be simple and squeezed together roughly in the palm of my hand...SO, I made these again. Because he misses the finger imprints that was a signature in his grandma's raviolis. The rustic version will be for him, but if I make them for any of you, I'll try to make them prettier. :-) The nice thing about this time around is that I had both some leftover dough, and leftover meat mixture from the last time I made these, both neatly stored flat in Ziplocs in my freezer. They thawed within a couple hours and we were ready to go! It took less than 30mn to shape them and drop them in boiling salted water for a few minutes, while the simple butter sauce was heating and marinading..

December 25, 2022: