Cookbook Recipes

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Ricotta ravioli for the freezer

Homemade egg pasta filled with ricotta, mozzarella and jarred pesto, shaped and frozen raw for later.

Prep
41 min
Total
41 min
Yield
Makes about 36 ravioli, enough for 3 servings
Going in
Moderate
Steps
7

The pasta is made from scratch, the filling is not. It is built around a single 280 g tub of ricotta and a jar of Classico basil pesto, and there is no hard cheese in it. This version stops at the freezer: nothing is cooked.

To cook from frozen later, drop the ravioli straight into gently boiling salted water without thawing and give them a minute longer than fresh, until they float and the edges are tender. They suit a butter or pesto sauce.

The dough needs 30 minutes of resting, and the tray needs about 2 hours in the freezer. Neither is counted in the prep time below.

Method 7 steps

  1. Make the dough 9 min

    Mound the flour on a work surface and make a well in the centre. Crack in the eggs and add the salt.

    Beat the eggs with a fork, drawing flour in from the walls of the well until a shaggy mass forms. Knead until smooth and springy. The dough should feel firmer than bread dough.

    A stiff dough rolls thin without tearing. If it feels sticky, work in a little more flour.

  2. Rest the dough

    Wrap the dough tightly in plastic and leave it on the counter for 30 minutes.

    While it rests, set the ricotta in a sieve over a bowl to drain.

    Resting relaxes the gluten so the sheets stop springing back when rolled. Draining the ricotta prevents a wet filling, which is the main cause of burst ravioli.

  3. Mix the filling 3 min

    Stir the drained ricotta, pesto, mozzarella, egg yolk, garlic powder and salt together in a bowl. No cooking is needed.

    The mixture should hold its shape on a spoon. If it slumps, give the ricotta longer to drain.

    Taste it now. With no hard cheese in the mix, it should read slightly over-seasoned on its own, since plain pasta will surround it.

  4. Roll the pasta 12 min

    Cut the dough into 3 pieces and keep the ones you are not working with wrapped.

    Roll each piece until nearly translucent: the second thinnest setting on a pasta machine, or thin enough to read print through if rolling by hand. Dust with flour if it sticks.

    Covered dough will not dry out and crack at the edges.

  5. Fill and cut 15 min

    Spoon teaspoon-sized mounds of filling along half of each sheet, spaced about 4 cm apart.

    Wet the pasta around each mound with a damp finger, fold the other half of the sheet over, then press the air out from the centre of each mound outward before sealing. Cut with a pizza wheel or knife.

    Trapped air expands during cooking and splits the seams. Do not overfill: the mozzarella melts and pushes outward.

  6. Freeze on the tray 2 min

    Line a baking sheet with parchment and dust it with flour. Lay the ravioli out in a single layer, not touching, and freeze flat for about 2 hours, until hard.

    Do not cover the tray at this stage.

    Freezing them separately first stops them from fusing into one block in the bag.

  7. Bag and label 3 min

    Transfer the frozen ravioli to freezer bags, pressing out as much air as you can before sealing.

    Label with the date and the filling. Use within 2 months.

    Air in the bag causes freezer burn, which dries the pasta edges and makes them tough.