I’m currently battling a minor fascination with all things duck.  I can trace it back to its origin- the amazing duck egg raviolo I was served at top Seattle restaurant Spring Hill.  Since then I’ve cured duck breast into prosciutto, used duck eggs yolks in pasta dough (amazingly elastic!), poached the eggs to perfection, and even fried an egg up on my slab of pink Himalayan salt.  When I was a child of five, my father got the idea in his head that he wanted to dapple in farming and ranching, so he uprooted our bi-racial family from a happy if crowded existence in southern California and transplanted us to a freshly purchased homestead with acreage in BFE Idaho.  The folks in the small town didn’t quite know what to make of a middle-aged white guy with his dark-skinned bride (my mother), her two black teenagers (my half-siblings) and a four-year-old towhead who thought she was a boy and ran around naked all the time (me).  Consequently, our family was largely left to devise our own elaborate entertainment.  Since my brother and sister were busy fighting with each other and trying to master the art of break-dancing in the pasture, I made friends with the dogs and ducks. 

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Buonissimo! Finger-licking buonissimo is what you’ll be raving into next Tuesday if you step out on a limb and venture to make this crowd-pleasing pasta.  Just don’t tell your squeamish friends it’s made with duck eggs until after the first bite.  As is often the case with my culinary endeavors, I headed down to Pike Place Market to get some inspiration for what would be seasonally-appropriate to make for a fun dinner for five yesterday.   It could not be a better time of year to be at the market- every fruit stall is simply bursting over with bounty and the crisp autumn colors have us here at the Salty Seattle household all in a swoon.

 It was one of those days where just about everything I saw wanted to come home with me, from unnecessary gadgetry like a melon-balling set at Kitchen Basics to the absolutely gorgeous duck eggs from the Pike Place Market Creamery.  By the end of my unhinged spree, I wondered what on earth I would sort out for dinner from my unlikely mélange- definitely an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink kind of a journey. 

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