Over in the fresh pasta department at Eataly on Friday, it seemed that Luca Donofrio was getting a head start on Valentine’s day by featuring a red pasta. I was seduced.

Once it had been cooked however, the gorgeous pasta, Casunziei, lost some of its color, but it was still rather valentine-ish in its loveliness, and especially the loveliness of its taste.

The pockets are a Piedmontese specialty similar to pierogis.  These were half-circle dough pouches, in this case I believe beet ravioli, with a filling of radicchio, Speck, and ricotta.

• I boiled them gently and briefly, then moved them around in the simplest of sauces, some rich ‘Kerrygold Pure Irish Butter‘ heated with some fresh sage leaves, also from Eataly, and a sprinkling of poppyseeds

• the wine was an Italian (Sicily) white, Fuori Strada Grillo 2014, whose gorgeous soft packaging presumably means a smaller carbon footprint than that of the glass bottles that have been around for maybe half a millenium
• the music was Hans Abrahmsen, Concerto for Piano (2000)