Wild Mushroom Ravioli with Swiss Chard

It seems like I begin every blog post with an apology about the dodgy photography.  The fact is, by the time supper hits the table, I honestly don't feel like setting up a Vogue photo shoot to capture its brilliance!  Perhaps I should change the name of the blog to "Dodgy Pictures of Acceptable Food."

As usual, the photo does not do this dish justice.  It was one of the quickest suppers I've ever put together, and probably one of the best we've had in a while.

I used refrigerated ravioli I found at my local City Market.  I will definitely purchase it again to have on hand in the freezer for quick suppers.  Here's the link to the product description.  I don't do the affiliate link thing, so I'm just supplying it because I think it's a great product.  I haven't tried any of the other flavors, but I'm game!

The cast of characters for this meal was fairly limited.  

1 package of ravioli- cooked according to package instructions.

4 tablespoons of butter- yes, I know that sounds excessive, but it was delicious

Swiss Chard- however much you have- I just cut what was ready in the garden- about one medium sized bunch- I removed and chopped the stems, then rough chopped the leaves

2 cloves minced garlic- or if you are lazy like me, one good squirt of the garlic paste from a tube

2 tablespoons prepared pesto- you can omit this but I had a jar I needed to use up

2 handfuls of walnuts- you could also use pine nuts or almonds

fresh or dried sage- the sage in my garden has gone nuclear this year, so I used a huge handful- minced

I boiled the pasta water first because it took longer for the dirn water to come to a boil than it did to prepare and eat supper!  I salted the water and dropped the frozen ravioli in.  It needs 6 minutes once it comes back up to a boil.  While that was happening, I melted the butter in a skillet, then when it began to sizzle, I threw the fresh sage in to fry it a little and let it give some flavor to the butter.  Then I threw in the Swiss Chard stems and the walnuts.  I let them cook for a few minutes, then I stirred in the pesto and the Swiss Chard leaves.  By the time the leaves cooked down, the ravioli was ready, so I just lifted the raviolis straight from their cooking liquid and plopped them in the skillet with the other stuff.  The extra pasta water helped coat the ravioli with the browned butter and garlic.  

To plate the whole mess, I put the Swiss Chard mixture on the plate, then topped it with the ravioli.  Anything left on the bottom of the skillet got scraped off and put on top!

This was very satisfying. It fed 2 people.  We each got about 6 large raviolis.  I love this because it is completely interchangeable.  You could use spinach instead of chard, any flavor ravioli, and any herb or nut combination.  

This will go into our regular supper rotation. If you make this, or some variation of it, let me know how it turned out!