Butternut Squash Tortellini Dumplings with a Sage Brown Butter Sauce

I do not own a pasta maker. I wish I did, but unfortunately I do not. So when I was craving some homemade tortellini, I got a bit creative and decided to use pre-made dumpling wrappers that I had picked up from my local Asian market and whipped up this dish. The tortellini dumplings are filled with butternut squash and a bit of ricotta, and they’re topped with a creamy and nutty sage brown butter sauce.

Burro e salvia, or butter and sage, are a classic Italian pairing, but I added pine nuts and a teensy hint of garlic to the sauce to really bring out the flavor of the butternut squash. It’s all topped off with a bit of parmesan, which adds sharpness and umami to the dish.

Butternut Squash Tortellini Dumplings with a Sage Brown Butter Sauce

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 15 minutes mins

Servings: 1 person

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: Italian, Italian Fusion

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

• ¾ cup butternut squash cut up
• 1 tbsp ricotta
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 8 dumpling wrappers
• 1 clove garlic whole
• 6 leaves sage
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp pine nuts
• salt and black pepper to taste
• freshly grated parmesan to top

Method

 

Making the Tortellini Dumplings

1. Heat up a pan on medium heat.
2. Cut up the butternut squash into small cubes (they don't need to be perfect, they will be mashed shortly, but the smaller they are, the faster they will cook).
3. Once the pan is hot, add in the butternut squash along with a splash of water, cover the pan and let it cook until the squash is completely cooked through.
4. Transfer the cooked squash to a bowl, add in the ricotta, and mash it into a paste-y filling. Add nutmeg, salt, and pepper to taste.
5. Place a small scoop of filling into the center of a dumpling wrapper. Wet the edges of the wrapper with water. Fold the dumpling in a half moon shape. Bring both edges of the half moon together until it makes a tortellini like shape. I was able to make roughly 8 dumplings from this amount of filling.
   

Making the Sauce and Cooking the Dumplings

1. Heat up a pan on medium heat.
2. Add in the butter, garlic, sage, and pine nuts to the pan.
3. Let the butter simmer until it becomes bubbly and turns brown.
   
4. Add in the dumplings along with ⅛ cup + 1 tbsp of water and cover the pan for 3 minutes to let the dumplings cook through.
   
5. After 3 minutes, uncover the pan, add salt and parmesan to taste, serve up the dumplings hot, and enjoy!
   

Notes

• Don’t skip out on the parmesan! It really helps balance out the flavors in the dish. 
• The brown butter sauce adds a great nutty flavor to the whole dish, and the darker you make your sauce, the nuttier the flavor will be. My butter sauce pictured above is more of a blonde color but you can keep cooking the butter down until it reaches a deep caramel color if you’re feeling extra nutty!
• You may see milk solids form in the butter, do not be alarmed and just keep them in the sauce, it’ll taste great. 
• You can remove the whole garlic clove from the sauce one it’s cooked if you’d like, however the garlic does get really nicely roasted and melty and I personally ate mine whole after I ate the tortellini. 
• Feel free to experiment with the filling or the nuts you use! This would taste great with walnuts or pistachios, or a pumpkin filling as well. 

Enjoy and please leave any feedback or questions in the comments below!

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