Friday, 4/9/10 – Rice & Pasta

We made my favorite thing ever on Friday – pasta. Now, I understand that I'm often not very discerning with the "favorite thing ever" award (i.e. fuzzy socks, spring and "Milo & Otis," among others), but I truly love pasta. Growing up as an Italian American, I think I've eaten almost every single type of pasta ever made, and even remember my mom renting a pasta maker when I was a kid and pumping out miles of spaghetti. I was dying for Friday's lesson, though, because I felt that learning to make pasta by hand would take my cooking to a whole new level. While dried and boxed pasta is just fine, there's nothing like beautiful, fresh ravioli or fettuccini, especially with homemade tomato sauce.

We started class with a delicious saffron risotto. Risotto is my deal; my schtick. While I don't get to cook it all that often, I love to experiment by adding different flavors to the creamy rice – my favorite being a butternut squash and fresh sage risotto that was so good it put Steve in the hospital. Literally. (Long story). I rarely cook with saffron (because it costs an arm and a leg) but in this recipe it gives the risotto such a savory and exotic taste; it also makes it amazingly yellow! We then prepared potato gnocchi and served it with a sage and pine nut butter sauce, which we ate for dinner. Wow, delicious. The gnocchi were fun to make, because the little potato pieces need to be texturized in some way before cooking so that they cook more evenly and allow the sauce to adhere. This was traditionally done with the tines of a fork, by rolling the piece with your thumb down the fork, causing it to roll back on itself; these days they have gnocchi boards with grooves to make this a little easier. I like to experiment at school with the tools I also have available at home, so that I don't get used to using special equipment yet can't reproduce at home because I don't have the proper stuff. I used the fork tines, and although my gnocchi were a little messier than the ones made with gnocchi boards they were delicious and tender, complemented well by the crunch of the pine nuts.

One of the most exciting things I've done since entering culinary school has been the making of fresh ravioli on Friday. We made the dough, kneaded it, let it rest. Then we used the pasta presses to make nice long sheets and made small pockets, filling the pockets with the ricotta we made on Wednesday mixed with some fresh herbs and cheese. After pressing the little ravioli out into beautiful shapes and pinching the edges to secure the filling, we dropped them into boiling salted water. We also made a fresh tomato sauce, with which we served the ravioli. Yay! It sounds easy because it is! The best part is that you can experiment with the filling, creating any flavors, savory or sweet, that you want! How exciting…to me at least.

Finally, we learned the perfect rice pudding recipe. Oh happy day, oh happy day. Rice pudding all around! It was so delicious, but then again I have a soft spot for the pudding of rice. In college, there was a dinky Chinese buffet on campus that we used to go to for "special occasions." In addition to the most delicious MSG-laced bourbon chicken, they had killer rice pudding. So naturally I made friends with the nice hostess, and they would sell me quarts of their rice pudding for $3. We had a little problem with food stealers at the sorority, so I would store my quart containers in the basement fridge labeled, "Maggots – Science Experiment." No one went near my secret treat…suckas. Sometimes you gotta fight for the right.

I am just having a blast at school. Well, I think that's an understatement, but don't tell Chef or any of the school administrators because it might hurt my street cred, something I am constantly trying to defend. Having a face tat won't help if you can't perfect your external apathy.