I'm testing a little theory of mine that like colored foods taste good together. Like all oddball theories of mine, this one has very little basis and dubious origins. It sort of worked... with a bit of tweaking.
I roasted some apples, butternut squash, carrots and garlic until softened and then pureed them with some orange juice and orange peel (VB: "Are we having fruit salad for dinner?"). Then I filled them into some store-bought potsticker wrappers. I tried two sauces with them -- first, a traditional sage butter sauce, except with butter substitute. It shouldn't be surprising to anyone that butter substitute is not a good choice here. I don't know what I was thinking (palm to face)! The sauce was greasy and not very flavorful (I think I forgot to bruise the sage). And it also wasn't surprising that the raviolis were too sweet and smelled too much like orange Pledge.
Second sauce attempt was much better. I made some pesto with parsley, scallion, pine nuts, garlic and olive oil. It paired well with the raviolis because they were less sweet with only a hint of orange. And the fresh herbs enhanced the earthiness of the squash, carrots and apples. But the pesto merely elevated the raviolis to "edible," an upgrade from "gross."
Call me stubborn, but I think there's something to my little theory despite what happened here. This is probably a failure in execution. But I learned:
- Fruit salad is not a good idea for dinner.
- Ingredients that belong in potpourri shouldn't be stuffed into raviolis.
- Respect the butter.
- But punish your herbs.
- When in doubt, add more garlic.
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