Homemade Ravioli: Make Your Own Monday #2

It's that time of the week again, where I feature a culinary adventure in making at home something that I have previously only bought from a grocery store.  This week, it's ravioli.  They a lot easier than I thought they'd be, but they are time consuming. They are cheaper and tastier than anything you can buy.  I get to control the flavor and ingredients, too.

First of all, there are a few tools that are needed.  If you have a pasta machine to roll out your dough, you are way ahead.  Otherwise, you will have to roll it out with a rolling pin until it gets to the desired thickness (or thinness, rather).  A ravioli maker and a ravioli crimper are also pretty important.  Look at second hand stores for these.  You can still make these without the ravioli maker, but that crimper is hard to replicate by hand.  You would have to use a knife and fork...I think.

Start with a basic pasta recipe such as this one.  Run it through your pasta machine (or roll it out) until it looks like this:

 

 If you have one, get out your ravioli maker and crimper.

 

Now, make your filling.  For just plain cheese, here is a delicious recipe.

Cheese Ravioli Filling:

24 ounces ricotta OR drained cottage cheese (put in a sieve & drain over night in the fridge)

2 eggs

4 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

dash ground nutmeg

Mix everything in a bowl.

 

 Lay the thin pasta dough on top of the ravioli maker so that one half is on and one half is still on the counter waiting to be folded over the filling.  Place one teaspoon of filling on each ravioli.

 

 Fold the pasta dough over the filling.

 

 Place top of ravioli maker onto dough.

 

 Place the filled ravioli mass onto the counter and begin to cut them apart with the ravioli crimper.

 

 If you don't have a crimper, you will have to cut them apart with a knife and then crimp the edges with a fork.  This recipe made 96 ravioli.  You can freeze them for future meals or boil them to eat immediately.  Treat them just like the fresh or frozen ravioli you buy at the store.

 

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