Italian with Old friends

  Many people collect many different things, and have a few collections myself.  I collect some coins, piggy banks, cd's, dvd's,  my favorite is my cookie jars, but my most treasured collection is my friends that I have been blessed to have through the years.   I have been very lucky to keep so many with me which is why it is a collection.  I am in touch with friends as far back as the 4th Grade in 1978. I even recently got a note from a friend who went through school with me from nursery school in 1973.  I am still close to my friend from the 5th Grade, and then my next oldest that I am close to is a group of 3 friends, We'll call them Bonzo, Yak and Adrienne.  Those are nicknames you will find referenced on our High School yearbook pages.  
  So 28 years later, Adrienne and I have both been through some pretty major life changes recently and we got together yesterday in the solidarity of friendship to cook.  We share the same passion and both find that we can lose ourselves in our kitchens and yesterday we got lost together.  Adrienne happens to be going to cooking school right now, so we pooled our cooking talents and made a fabulous meal.   I made my cheese ravioli  (from the Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken) for her and she made me the best sauce I ever had.   I had a lot of trouble with my usually perfect dough yesterday.  I think I must have miscounted my flour cups and used too much, and my dough was very dry and hard to work with.  Thankfully by the time it was cooked, it was still delicious.  The ricotta filling was creamy and Adrienne's fresh nutmeg was just the perfect touch.  Adrienne's sauce was just amazing.  She starts with a pork rib base for flavor and adds tomato puree, bouquet garni, and veal stock.  It makes for wonderful rich flavor that was a perfect accompaniment to the ravoli.  I made the Spinach Torta Alla Hoboken as a side dish, we added some good wine and we had a wonderful day and meal.   Along the way we munched on delicious crusty bread with Irish butter, black truffle butter, burrata ( very creamy mozzerella made from water buffalo milk and cream) , Proscesso sparkling wine, and chocolate.   Our boys had a great time together and liked our food, so a good day was had by all.