Cookbook Recipes

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Ricotta ravioli in pesto sauce

Homemade egg pasta filled with ricotta and mozzarella, tossed in jarred basil pesto loosened with butter and pasta water.

Prep
39 min
Cook
8 min
Total
47 min
Yield
Serves 3
Going in
Moderate
Steps
8

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, which does double duty in the filling and the sauce. There is no hard cheese in either.

The dough needs 30 minutes of resting that is not counted in the prep time below. Use that time to drain the ricotta.

Method 8 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 before filling. With no hard cheese in the mix, it should read slightly over-seasoned on its own, since plain pasta surrounds 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 and rest the finished ravioli on a floured tray.

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

  6. Boil the ravioli 4 min

    Bring a wide pot of well salted water to a gentle boil and cook the ravioli in two batches, until they float and the edges feel tender, about 3 to 4 minutes.

    Scoop out a mug of the cooking water before draining.

    A hard rolling boil tears the seams. Keep the water moving gently.

  7. Loosen the pesto 2 min

    Melt the butter in a large skillet over low heat, then take the pan off the burner entirely.

    Stir in the pesto and lemon juice with about 45 ml of the reserved pasta water, until it loosens into a pourable sauce.

    Pesto should not boil. Heat dulls the basil colour and turns the oil bitter.

  8. Toss and serve 2 min

    Lift the ravioli into the skillet with a slotted spoon and turn them gently until coated, adding more pasta water a splash at a time if the sauce tightens.

    Finish with the black pepper.

    The starch in the pasta water is what binds the oil into a sauce that clings.