Recipes for Pasta

Ingredients:

# 1/2 cup fresh Ricotta cheese
# 1/4 cup grated Mozzarella cheese
# 1/4 cup grated Provolone cheese
# 1 egg yolk
# 1 teaspoon minced garlic
# 1 tablespoon chopped parsley
# Salt and black pepper
# 11 in. by 14 in. fresh pasta sheet, cut into 2-inch squares (32 squares)
# 1 cup warm Marinara sauce
# 1/4 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Directions:

Preheat the fryer. In a mixing bowl, combine the cheeses, egg yolk, garlic and parsley together. Mix thoroughly. Season the mixture with salt and pepper. Place 1 tablespoon of the filling in the center of 16 pasta squares. Lightly wet the edges of the pasta with water. Place 1 pasta square on top of the filled square. Press the edges of the square firmly to seal the square. Repeat the procedure until all the squares are sealed. Fry the squares in batches, until golden brown about 3 to 4 minutes. Remove the ravioli from the oil and drain on a paper-lined plate. Season the ravioli with salt and pepper. Serve the raviolis with the warm tomato sauce and garnish with the grated Parmesan cheese.

Makes 4 appetizer servings.

These ravioli can be used also as a dessert by preparing them as follows:

• Take 1/2 pound of flour
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• 2 tablespoons of lard

Work this into a paste and roll out thin.

Take one-half pound of curds, add one egg, and the yolk of a second egg, two tablespoons of granulated sugar, a few drops of extract of vanilla. Mix well together and add to the paste as before. Then fry in lard until a golden brown. Serve with powdered sugar.

• 1 small bunch of spinach
• 1/2 pound of curds

Cook the spinach, drain, and chop up fine, add the curds, one egg, salt and pepper, dash of nutmeg, and a little grated cheese. Add to the paste, and boil as before.

Take one lamb’s brains and parboil in slightly salted water for five minutes. Put into a bowl with a small quantity of curds, one egg, salt and pepper, dash of nutmeg, and a little grated Parmesan cheese, and mix all together. Then put by teaspoonfuls on the paste as in preceding receipt. Cook for ten minutes in boiling salted water, and serve with tomato sauce.

Prepare the paste as in Ribbon Macaroni.

Take whatever meat is desired–chicken, turkey, or veal–this must always be cooked. (Left-over meat may be utilized this way.) Chop the meat very fine, add one tablespoon of grated Parmesan cheese, one egg, a dash of nutmeg, a dash of grated lemon-peel, one tablespoon of butter, cold. Mix these ingredients in a bowl. Take a teaspoon of the mixture and put it into the extended paste, about two inches from the edge. Take another spoonful and put it about two inches away from the first spoonful. Continue to do this until you have a row of teaspoonfuls across the paste. Then fold over the edge of the paste so as to cover the spoonfuls of mixture, and cut across the paste at the bottom of them. Then cut into squares with the meat in the middle of each square; press down the paste a little at the edges so the meat cannot fall out. Continue to do this until all the meat and the paste are used up.

Put the little squares of paste and meat into the boiling salted water a few at a time, and boil for ten minutes. Serve with tomato sauce, or butter and grated Parmesan cheese.