Years ago, a friend gave me an Imperia hand-cranked pasta machine as a housewarming gift. It sat in my kitchen cabinet gathering dust because, truth be told, I was afraid of it. 

Flipping through food magazines one day while in line at the grocery store checkout, I came across a “how to make your own pasta” article in Cooking Light. Instead of skipping over the subject as usual, or telling myself dry pasta will do just fine thank you, I paid attention to the easy to follow photographs and simple ingredients and wondered, could it be this simple? I felt especially daring and decided to make fresh ravioli with ricotta and spinach.