Make 1,000 ravioli? It must be the holiday season

Inside the North Beach Victorian she has lived in on and off since she was born, Anna Ballard was fussing with the coffee maker.

"I never use this thing now that I live alone," she said. But this was ravioli day, a 100-year-old holiday tradition, which meant she'd be having company.

Ballard and relatives, under the guidance of her cousin, Anna Capurro - part of San Francisco's Alioto family and the clan's master ravioli maker - were arriving to make more than 1,000 tiny ravioli for Christmas dinner.

Ballard had buzzed me in to her flat on the top floor of an early 20th century building hidden from the street. When I walked up to her refurbished kitchen with a view stretching from Fisherman's Wharf to the Golden Gate Bridge, I felt as if I had reached an inner sanctum.

I had been invited by my second cousin Trish, Ballard's daughter-in-law. I've loved Italy since living there in the mid-1990s, and was thrilled to find I was related, however distantly, to one of the city's storied Italian-American families.

Soon the other Anna - Anna Capurro - arrived. They grew up like sisters in the building adjacent to where Ballard lives today. Capurro's mother, Conchetta Alioto, did most of the cooking. The men in the family were in the fishing industry, and the families shared most meals. Capurro's relatives still own restaurants on the wharf, while Ballard's late husband and sons became firefighters and police officers.

The ravioli recipe came from Conchetta's mother, Anna Balestrieri, who learned it from a Genovese neighbor after arriving in the United States.

"Sicilians are not ravioli people," Capurro said, explaining that fresh pasta is not typical to southern Italy, where her ancestors are from. Still, the ravioli stayed in the family.

Trish, Nancy, another daughter-in-law, and Nancy's daughter, Sarah, arrived with Prosecco and pastries.

"It's ravioli day, ravioli day!" said Sarah, 28. Because she is the pastry chef at Wood Tavern in Oakland, Sarah appears to be the one who will take the ravioli to the next generation.

As a little girl, Sarah was only allowed to cut the ravioli; now Sarah and Trish are in charge of the pasta. They spread a neatly pressed bed sheet over the table, place a large board on top and begin mixing the dough, splitting a 5-pound sack of flour.

Nancy helps push the browned meat, onions, greens and soaked bread through a meat grinder into a large pot for the filling. Capurro oversees the addition of eggs - 14 in all - Parmesan cheese and spices. As we tasted spoonfuls, she adjusted the amount of allspice, nutmeg and salt.

"The ravioli come out differently each year. We never quite remember what we do," Sarah said. With Capurro's help, they can make everything without consulting the family cookbook. But one year when she didn't join them, they had to call her.

"We said, 'Auntie Anna, we can't make the dough,' " said Sarah. "And she said, 'Whaddya mean? It's the easiest thing.' "

The day had started out cloudy. As the sun came out, a flock of the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill landed in a nearby tree, a flash of green and red against the whitening sky.

The dough had rested, and the filling had cooled. With a rolling pin and a dowel about 3 feet across, Sarah and Trish each began rolling a piece of the dough into larger and larger circles on the floured board, while Capurro coached.

"Stretch it, stretch it!" Capurro urged. "Remember, you have to see the grain of wood through the dough."

Once that was accomplished, they pulled the dough halfway off of the board. They spread the filling evenly over the top, then folded the other half on top. They used the family's ancient ravioli rolling pin to press the filled dough into ravioli shapes, then a serrated ravioli cutter to separate them.

Halfway through rolling, we stopped for lunch. In a serious break from tradition, they cooked up a batch of ravioli so I could try them. They were delicate in every way, with a lightly spiced filling and a thin and tender pasta.

"More salt in the filling next time," everyone agreed.