Ravioli take-out

Ravioli; tomato sauce.

Canevari’s Ravioli, 695 Lewis Rd.,
Santa Rosa, CA 95404
(707) 545-6941

I’ve driven past the place dozens of times over the last fifty years and more: Canevari’s ravioli, in a little bungalow-turned-into-shop in a residential-small retail part of town, not far from Santa Rosa Junior College, and I’ve always wondered about their ravioli. Friends who live nearby were noncommittal about it. Today we were driving past, with other friends, and on the spur of the moment we decided to get a couple of trays for lunch. On the wall, a black-and-white photo from 1939 of an aproned Italian pastaficio, arms dramatically akimbo, and next to him a little boy exactly imitating expression and gesture. Today that little boy runs the place. As he emerged from the back room with boxes of ravioli and plastic containers of sauce Lindsey suggested we get instead some of the ravioli in the display case, already cooked and sauced: we’d only have to warm them up. You want those, the man asked, rather incredulous? Those are commercial. We stayed with the original idea, took them home and followed his instructions exactly: bring water to a boil, throw in the frozen ravioli, let the water come back to a boil, cook exactly five and a half minutes. I thought they were a little heavy on the nutmeg and the sauce oddly thickened, but generally okay. We’re eating peasant food, Richard said.

Louis Preston Barbera 2006