Red Beet and Feta Ravioli with Orange-Thyme Brown Butter Sauce

I was grocery shopping the other day when I saw some wonton wrappers in the refrigerated section. I'd never used them before and kind of wanted to try them out to make ravioli. I've seen this technique on the Food Network--Giada DeLaurentiis is particularly fond of it. I've often wondered, though, if wonton wrappers can really serve as a substitute for fresh, rolled pasta dough.

I decided to make beet ravioli, something for which I've seen a lot of recipes online, but I couldn't remember the exact ingredients. When I got home and looked at one of the actual recipes, it called for ricotta cheese (I only had feta), salt, pepper, and breadcrumbs for the filling, all of which I luckily had on hand.

I roasted two beets and put those, cut up, in the food processor with a half cup of the cheese and salt and pepper. I formed the triangle-shaped ravioli by placing a rounded teaspoon of filling on each wonton-wrapper square and sealing with water.

The original recipe I was going off of suggested a butter-poppy seed sauce, but since I didn't have any poppy seeds, I decided to use orange zest and thyme instead. I boiled the raviolis, and then put a rather huge amount of butter, orange zest, and thyme in a skillet and allowed it to brown. Then I tossed the boiled ravioli in the butter sauce.

The wonton wrappers worked out ok...they had the same flavor, but the texture was off. They weren't dense and chewy but more smooth and delicate. Smooth and delicate is nice, but it's not really like ravioli. The wonton wrappers also had a difficult time holding the filling in, and it kept sticking to the skillet and tearing when I tried to toss it in the butter sauce.

Next time, I think I'll stick with traditional pasta ravioli, even if it is more work. But even though I was a little disappointed in the wonton wrappers, the ravioli were still excellent! The filling was earthy and a little tangy from the cheese, and the thyme, orange zest, and butter worked really well with it. In fact, I can't imagine a poppy seed and butter sauce being even near as good.

Also while at the store this weekend I bought my first Christmas cactus! I don't know why it took me so long to purchase one since they are cheap and pretty easy to take care of. They remind me of my Granny so much; she always seemed to have a few scraggly Christmas cacti hanging around. And I found a cute little pot to put it in. It looks really cute on our red table by the couch.