Goat's cheese ravioli with asparagus

Tam West

Mum Chand doesn’t get time to make pasta but come the weekend Hospobaby and Dad Sid set to work on handmade ravioli

For the pasta dough

600 g	High grade flour, plus extra for dusting (Main)
6	Eggs
2 Tbsp	Oil

For the ravioli

3 bunches	Asparagus, bottoms trimmed by 2cm (Main)
250 g	Soft goat's cheese (Main)
50 g	Sage, rolled and finely sliced
10 whole	Sage leaves, use up to 15 as desired
100 g	Unsalted butter
100 g	Macadamia nuts, 50g chopped and 50g whole

Directions

To make the pasta dough

1. In a food processor, using the dough attachment, pulse all the ingredients together until they resemble a crumble.
2. Dust your benchtop or a working surface with some flour and upturn the crumbly dough on to it. Using clean hands knead the pasta dough until it forms a pliable ball. Cover the ball with cling wrap and rest for 30 minutes.
3. After 30 minutes break the large dough ball into 4 smaller balls, flatten each one, dust with a little flour and put through the pasta machine, starting to roll the sheet from the machine's widest setting to a narrower setting, until the sheet is the desired thickness (paper thin). Make sure you dust the pasta sheet with flour in between rolling.
4. Repeat the same process for the remaining dough. You should have 4 long sheets of pasta dough.

To make the ravioli

1. Chop half the asparagus finely and mix with the goat's cheese in a medium sized bowl.
2. Add the chopped macadamias, sage and season with salt and pepper.
3. Take one sheet of pasta and cut it into 2 equal halves. On one half, spoon the cheese filling in the middle at equal intervals. Lay the other pasta sheet over the filled sheet and cover it. Using your fingers press the sheets together near the filling ensuring there are no air pockets. Using a round cookie cutter cut out the filled pasta into ravioli. Repeat the same steps for the other 3 sheets of rolled pasta.
4. In a large saucepan bring some salted water to a boil. Drop your ravioli into the water and cook until they float to the top (around 3 minutes). Drain the ravioli.
5. In a cold pan add the butter and turn the hob to medium heat. Add the sage and sauté. Add the rest of the asparagus. Once the butter turns a nutty brown toss the blanched pasta into it. Season and add the whole macadamias. Serve and enjoy.

“Hospo”, short for hospobaby, is a term used regularlyin the hospitality industry. Chand and Sid own the restaurants Sidart and Cassia, so Zoya has been part of the hospitality industry from day one, hence the term “hospobaby”.