Ravioli Riches: Market City Caffe's Pasta-Perfect Menu

Sup on this: Sweet Corn Agnolotti and other savory choices await.

What whets your appetite more: When a restaurant introduces a special, single-focus menu, one meant to complement its permanent menu, for a few delectable weeks out of each year? Or pillow-like foodstuffs, where a tasty outer layer envelops a stuffing of cheese, meats, nuts, or vegetables?

Answer: They're both pretty darn scrumptious, and, yes, we were blatantly talking about the ravioli in our second question (though calzones could certainly apply). These two appetite-whetters are dovetailing -- or raviolitailing, if you prefer -- at Market City Caffe in Burbank, which is hosting its sixth annual Ravioli Festival through Sunday, Nov. 2.

Nope, this isn't a festival with balloons in the trees and a clown. It's a separate menu, distinct from the cucina Italiana's regular offerings, and it spotlights nine different ravioli dishes, all savory, all tempting to the serious lover of little pasta pillows of stuffed spicy, meaty joy.

How to choose among all nine? Short ribs continue to be a hot dish in whatever form they appear, and there is a ravioli paying homage to the deep-toned dish (think osso bucco-style and smoked tomato sauce).

It's an autumnal offering, but so is the Butternut Squash Agnolotti, which is sauced with an also-autumnal sage brown butter.

Sage brown butter enjoyment on top of ravioli eating? We wouldn't call it an embarrassment of riches, because we're not embarrassed.

The Short Rib Ravioli is $18, the butternut presentation $17, and there are seven ravioli entrees, beyond that, to try.

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Wouldn't it be wonderful to have a pillow of each, upon your plate?

Actually, scratch that, what with the melded flavors and such. Better just to return a few times and try the ones you want to try, and if you can't get them all in, by Nov. 2, anticipate the next time Market City Caffe's special, ravioli-riffic menu rolls around.

More pillow-pocket foods stuffed with stuff, please, inventors of new noshables. Be ravioli-inspired.

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