'Crab' Ravioli accompanied by Caesar Salad

I am learning that a big part of cooking isn't about following every recipe to the 'T', but to follow the recipe and changing it to cater to your likes, dislikes and what you have available; be it in your fridge or the local supermarket. This is what I have done with the ravioli. I followed the original crab recipe, tasted it, really disliked it, fed it to the dog and improvised! I checked out the fridge, raided the 'left overs' and came up with a sweet potato, sun-dried tomato and red pesto filling.
My Mother warned me before I started making the pasta, that it takes a ridiculously long time and is very frustrating. Now I know what she means! It took my Father and I nearly 3 hours to roll out, fill and make a small amount of ravioli. I used 2 different methods to make it; an attachment for the pasta roller machine (which ended up as a total waste of time and money and we chucked it in the bin!) and a ravioli mold, where you put one rolled out piece of pasta on the bottom, small dollops of filling in each square and roll a second piece of pasta on the top. They were both pretty disastrous and the shapes were massively irregular! Thank goodness that it tasted nice!
For similar recipe go to:
http://www.thefirstmess.com/2012/01/02/sweet-potato-ravioli-with-kale-pesto/

Ratings:
Taste: 8
Appearance: 6
Difficulty: 10

Caesar salad has to be on every bistro menu that I've ever seen, so it is a good recipe to learn. Essentially it is just lettuce, croutons and a dressing with parmesan. With hindsight, I probably didn't crush the anchovies and garlic enough, nor whisk the egg, oil, lemon juice and mustard together for long enough either. However, the taste was very nice, albeit rustically strong! I loved the taste of the garlic croûtons, which were easy to make, but I forgot to take out the cloves of garlic, which made for an interesting experience for my brothers when they bit unsuspectingly into them! The salad went very well with the ravioli for a great summer holiday lunch.
For similar recipe go to:
http://www.curtisstone.com/recipe/caesar-salad

Ratings:
Taste: 9
Appearance: 8
Difficulty: 4