Holidays and a Recipe

The holidays are now in the past. We went to Winnipeg, stayed out at BF1’s place rather than at my mother’s place. BF1 has a big house and three bathrooms, and when you’re bringing four people into a home, you like to be able to get to the can when you need to get there. I also really didn’t want to put my mother out, and this way, she could take the kids (yea) while Hub and I partied. This is the first time my mum has taken our kids, and it was excellent.

I got to take BF1’s truck out a few times, alone, and the expanse of the land, the grey light in the afternoon (daylight from 8:15 a.m. to 4:30 p.m….maybe), the light snow blowing across the highway, makes one feel all alone in the world, like you could drive forever and not get anywhere. We don’t drive fast, at or just over the speed limit (100kph, maybe 90 sometimes) and the people leave their Christmas lights on until February. Keeps the cold winter at bay, and alleviates the darkness a little bit. By mid-Feb, you start to feel like the dark is closing in on you, even as the days get longer. The appearance of the lone house that still has its lights on is a welcoming, warming sight……….unless you’re so deep in your SAD winter that you just mutter under your breath about the power-wasting idiots who can’t just take the damn things down already. Except yours are still up too, because it’s been too cold to get out on a ladder to take the lights down, and you might as well flick the switch and turn them on for a few more weeks, what the hell.

We don’t often use white lights at Christmas. When I was in Scottsdale Arizona one year, my aunt was very excited because everyone used white lights. Oooh, they all use white lights, aren’t they gorgeous? and no, I didn’t think so. No colour? Then again, no snow either, so the white lights sort of mimicked that. Here we use coloured lights and white lights; we’ve got lots of snow.

We did an overnight trip to Kenora and stayed in my sister’s big house. She heats the house with the fireplace and a pellet stove, and it gets really warm and cozy…we slept upstairs in her room and she slept by the fireplace so she could keep it going all night. In the morning we all looked out the expanse of windows over the lake, hoping for sun to bounce off the frost on the trees…but to no avail. Still, you can’t deny the serenity of country living and an expansive view….until five terriers start barking because a cat has wandered past their crates in the basement.

Despite the fact that we had to be somewhere every single day, we had a really great trip and never felt particularly rushed. In the background, the death of Hub’s brother-in-law lurked, and Christmas eve morning held a bit of a pall since that was the funeral morning and we weren’t there. We knew that everyone back home understood that our holiday had already been planned months in advance, but it was still a difficult decision to leave on Friday when Danilo passed away.

Seems a similar thing happened in the summer when Angie passed away. Maybe we should quit planning holidays to go and visit my family…..

Hub’s sister is getting rid of her husband’s things, many of which are worn out and not worth keeping and so her children are discarding them. Danilo, however, was a great wearer of the fedora, and he had an extensive collection of gorgeous hats. Unfortunately, his head was also about the same size as mine (tiny), so the grandchildren are wearing Nono’s capelli, and are thrilled to play gangsters.

We got back from the prairie driving extravaganza on Sunday the 30^th, and got a visit in with Hub’s brother next door, and his sister when she came by later. The kids were all excited about their new toys, (more Christmas presents!) but left them at Zio’s so that they would have something to play with there. On New Year’s Eve I cleaned the house all day and tried to unpack everything—to no avail, since much remains unpacked—and made a dinner for BF2 and his friend, who drove up from Niagara, where they were staying. When BF2 was living in London he often went to the market where he knew he could get fresh pasta, and commented on a particular ravioli with squash in it. So I made the following:

Squash Manicotti for Four

You need:

1 package of fresh pasta in sheets. I used Oliveri although if I had the time, I would make my own.

1 small squash. Cut the thing in half or quarters and bake at 325^oF for however long it takes for it to soften up. I used an acorn squash and it took about 45 minutes.

1 container of ricotta

spices to your taste: ½ t salt, ½ t fresh ground pepper, ½ t allspice, ¼ t mild curry is what I used, you might want to add garlic but my tomato sauce had garlic in it so I didn’t.

1 egg

1 or 2 c seasoned tomato sauce (which of course was from the stuff I made this summer. Use something of good quality if you don’t have your own stock.)

½ c whipping cream. Not necessary but it was New Year’s eve.

9 x 13 in glass baking dish

You mix, in your food processor:

Scrape out the cooked squash, add all the ricotta, the egg and the spices and process away to a smooth paste. Now of course you’re hoping that you avoid salmonella poisoning when you taste this mixture, but if this is a concern then add the egg last. It’s only there to keep the filling from running out of the pasta and all over the dish anyway, and it won’t affect the taste. I did not fear salmonella (or rather, I forgot about the raw egg problem and tasted anyway) and tasted and adjusted until I got a flavour I liked, not too sweet and not too bland.

Preheat your oven to 400^oF.

You assemble:

The instructions on the pasta indicate that you should soak the sheets for 2min in cold water before using. Naturally I read this after I’d already assembled everything. I think it would have been a good idea to at least wet the things, although I didn’t have any trouble with the pasta and it cooked up just fine. As you like on that one. If you aren’t using any sauce then you’ll have to soak the sheets, but that would be crazy. If you make your own pasta then don’t soak anything.

The pasta sheets are the wrong size for manicotti, so you cut them in half….if you want narrower manicotti, then cut them lengthwise, and you’ll make four/sheet with a little leftover when you roll the filling. If you cut the sheets crosswise then you’ll get wider manicotti and you’ll make two/sheet, and you’ll still have a bit of pasta to cut off at the end. Of course this depends on how much filling you use.

If you’re using it, add the whipped cream to the tomato sauce. Spread a layer of this on the bottom of the pan, enough to cover but not so much that the pasta is going to swim in sauce.

Okay, so you’ve cut the pasta in half the way you like it. Add a heaping tablespoon of filling about 2.5cm from the beginning edge of the pasta, and roll over until the two edges overlap by about a cm, and slice off the extra pasta. Put the roll in the pan. Keep doing this until you’re out of filling or pasta, or the pan is as full as you need. Count on three rolls per person, plus or minus one. (I ate two, everyone else ate three.)

Cover the manicotti with more sauce, again, you don’t want the stuff swimming in sauce but remember that the pasta is going to soak up much of the liquid. I didn’t quite have enough at about 1.5 c total. Put a layer of (fresh, if you can get it) mozzarella or fruilano (if you can’t get fresh mozzarella) on top of the manicotti and sauce, and cover with foil.

Bake for 35 minutes, then remove the foil and bake for another 10 minutes.

Serve up with salad and bread (if you like), crisp white wine or a light red if you prefer. We had a sparkling prosecco and then some cabernet franc, so touched on both.

New Year's morning:


Happy New Year to all.