Cherry Brown Butter Ravioli

Kelley has always been a super fan of cherries. Me, not so much. It’s not that I don’t like them, its just a lot of work to cook with cherries. Heck, its a lot of work just to EAT cherries straight up. That is, until I got my Oxo cherry pitter! Whoa nelly do I love this thing! Its opened up a world of cherry recipes to my lazy ass. No more messing around with a paring knife and a slippery bowl of cherries. Just pop one in, clamp it down, and you’re done. I pitted nearly 6lbs of cherries in like 20 minutes the other day. It was so awesome!

The good news for you folks is that this means more cherry recipes to spread around! I feel lot of pressure this month because Kelley said the midwest cherry crop was terrible, so its up to me on the west coast to bring you some unique and delicious ideas for you to make at home with your cherries.

Let’s start with this recipe from my favorite, living in the west magazine, Sunset!

Cherry Brown Butter Ravioli recipe from Sunset magazine 

• 10 ounce store-bought cheese ravioli
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 3 tablespoons lemon juice 
• About 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
• 3 cups pitted and halved Rainier cherries
• 1/4 cup toasted almonds, roughly chopped 
• 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves

1. Cook pasta as package directs. Drain and spread out on a shallow serving platter. Tent with foil to keep warm.
2. Meanwhile, melt butter in a medium saucepan over high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until butter starts to turn medium brown and smells nutty, about 7 minutes. Remove from heat and carefully add lemon juice and 1/2 tsp. salt (it will bubble up). Pour all but 2 tbsp. brown butter into a small bowl; keep warm.
3. Put cherries in pan of brown butter and cook over medium heat, stirring often, until hot and skins start to wrinkle, about 7 minutes.
4. Pour cherries over reserved pasta along with half of reserved brown butter. Sprinkle with almonds and thyme, and add salt to taste. Serve with remaining butter.