I was originally planning to post a light-hearted and easy recipe about how to make a yummy plum drink, but Photograzing Community at SeriousEats.com was hosting an event this weekend, and I promised to post a recipe there. So I changed my mind and instead of making a simple plum drink, I took an endeavor of making fresh pasta ravioli from scratch. Here is my recipe featured on SeriousEats Weekend Cook and Tell: Fresh Pasta. Very exciting!
Even though the below recipe has many steps, making fresh pasta ravioli is actually pretty easy, especially because you have a very detailed tutorial that I created below. I have created and tested the below recipe, to make sure I have the exact proportions for the ravioli dough (pastry), so if you follow my steps precisely, you will create a wonderful ravioli dish that will impress your family and/or guests.
The most important part here is to roll your ravioli dough very thinly – that’s the secret to great tasting ravioli! To roll it thinly, the dough should have just the right proportion of water to flour, which I denoted in my ingredients section below. It is important to let dough sit for an hour, covered in plastic wrap, so that the gluten does its job, and the resulting dough is nice and elastic enough for you to work with.
And, finally, I think it’s great to learn how to make your own ravioli, because then you can endlessly experiment with fillings instead of just buying what grocery stores offer you. I am personally never impressed with the selection of pre-made ravioli in stores, so that’s primary reason why I learned to make my own.
How to make it from scratch: Ravioli with spinach and ricotta cheese filling, in tomato cream sauce
Prep time: 50 min
Cook time: 60 min
Ingredients for step 1: making ravioli dough from scratch. This is enough to make dough for 12 raviolis, using the mold (ravioli mold makes 12 ravioli). If I am making 24 ravioli, I’ll simply repeat this:
- 1 1/4 cup flour
- 1 egg
- 1/4 cup hot water
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
1) Mix flour with salt.
2) Stir water with egg until well mixed.
3) In a bowl, combine flour and egg-water mixture together and mix until well incorporated. Knead the dough until well-textured and firm. The dough should not be too wet or too sticky. It should only stick to itself, but not to your hands. However, it should not be too dry, either. Make the dough into a ball, cover with plastic wrap. Let the dough stand for 1 hour at room temperature before using. This allows gluten to work. You will be using this dough in the instructions that follow below:
Ingredients for step 2: spinach and ricotta cheese ravioli filling:
1 tbsp olive oil
1 big package spinach (20 oz)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
3/4 cup ricotta cheese
1/4 tsp salt
Ingredients for step 3: tomato cream sauce:
1 tbsp olive oil
2 big tomatoes
2 garlic cloves
5 sprigs thyme or more
1/4 cup white wine
1/2 cup heavy cream
20 grape tomatoes, yellow and red
salt
This recipe makes 24 ravioli, using the mold (which, I assume, uses regular sized ravioli shape).
How to make ravioli cheese filling:
1) Heat olive oil on medium heat, add spinach and cook covered, stirring occasionally, until spinach wilted, about 15 minutes.
2) Cook for 5 or 10 more minutes uncovered until all liquid evaporates.
3) Chop cooked spinach finely and move to a bowl. Add Parmesan cheese and ricotta cheese, salt to taste and mix well. Add more salt if necessary.
4) Divide the ravioli dough (instructions on how to make ravioli dough from scratch are above) into 2 equal halves and roll each half into a very thin sheet with a rolling pin. Make sure to have flour on hand and dust the working surface or rolling pan when necessary, because the dough will be sticky. It’s important that the ravioli dough be rolled very thinly (paper-thin), otherwise ravioli will be too solid when cooked, because dough expands during cooking. Also it will be really hard to use the ravioli mold if the dough is not thin enough.
5) Once you rolled sheets of dough, shape individual raviolis. To shape ravioli, I use a very handy device, Ravioli mould/tray, which works great! I purchased it at William-Sonoma, you can see the picture of it below:
6) Here is how to use Ravioli mould:
- dust the working tray with flour
- lay a thin layer of pastry on the tray
- press in the holes
- fill the holes with the filling, without overfilling
- cover with another layer of ravioli dough, which should lay flat all the way across the mould
- using the rolling pins or your fingers, press, close and cut the ravioli
- overturn the tray to let the ravioli come out
- below photos illustrate these steps
You can take the scraps of the dough and add it to your covered dough for future rolling.
6) When you are done shaping ravioli, bring a big pot of water to boil, add ravioli and cook for 5 minutes, then drain. Or, alternatively, freeze ravioli until you’re ready to cook them.
How to make tomato cream sauce:
7) Heat olive oil in a pan over medium heat. Chop tomatoes and garlic and add to the pan. Cook covered for about 10 minutes until tomatoes soften.
8) Add white wine and chopped thyme. Bring to boil and cook uncovered for 5 more minutes until half of liquid evaporates. Remove from heat, let it cool for a bit.
9) Then transfer to blender and puree the tomato mixture. Transfer the puree back to the pan, reheat to medium heat and add heavy cream. Stir until well incorporated.
10) Cut each grape tomato in half and add all of them to the pan with the tomato cream sauce. Salt to taste and and more chopped thyme if needed. Cook for 5 more minutes.
To serve, add cooked ravioli to the sauce at the last minute. Allow both ravioli and the sauce achieve same temperature. When serving on plates, garnish with thyme.
More ravioli recipes:
- Pumpkin ravioli with brown butter sauce and pecans
- Ravioli with goat cheese and spinach filling in parmesan cream sauce
More pasta recipes:
- Quick pasta with portobello mushrooms and green bell peppers
- Asian fish and peanut sauce noodles
- Healthy fettuccine alfredo with cauliflower sauce and sweet peas
- Macaroni and cheese with bacon and caramelized onions
- Easy Fettuccine Alfredo
- Easy homemade macaroni and cheese
- Asian salmon and noodles
- Easy pasta carbonara – perfect weeknight dish
- Spicy Asian noodles and mushrooms, with snow peas
- Pumpkin ravioli with brown butter sauce and pecans
- Garlic spicy shrimp and asparagus pasta
- Ravioli with goat cheese and spinach filling in parmesan cream sauce
- Stuffed manicotti pasta shells recipe with ricotta cheese and spinach filling
- Spicy curry shrimp pasta: curried tomato sauce, snap peas and orzo
- Creamy mushroom pasta with caramelized onions and spinach
- Beet and goat cheese fettuccine pasta
- Lamb vegetable noodle stew, Lagman
- Lobster pasta with porcini and tarragon cream sauce
I am sharing this recipe as one of “Sexy” dishes for February 2013 with Yahoo’s Shine Supper Club.
WOW! I am in awe. This looks amazing. I would really like to try this – alas I dont have the fancy gadgets, but I don’t have a ravioli mould. DO you think you could make it by hand?
Thank you! That mould is not that fancy, it cost around 20 dollars (one of the cheaper items at William-Sonoma), which is why I bought it
. Yes, you can make it by hand too, using round shaped or square shaped cookie cutters or using a water glass as a mold to cut out squares or circles of pasta. Then you just press the edges together with your fingers. To make fancy edges, you can use a fork or ravioli cutter (pretty cheap, too, about $6).
That looks divine!! I’m going to buy a mold tray today – You made me want to make ravioli and I love tomato cream sauce. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you! Yes, mold tray is very handy and pretty cheap too ($20). The pasta sheets should be rolled really thin (paper thin) to use the mold successfully.
This is amazing. Thank you for the step by step instructions. I have made ravioli a few times and always have such a difficult time getting them OUT of the mold! I never dusted the mold with flour, so I will try that next time. Your recipes are so beautiful!
Yes, if you dust the mold, ravioli should just fall out of it when you turn it upside down.
Your pasta looks wonderful. I’ve never made my own before and am lost in admiration for those that do. The filling and sauce look so delicious, just the sort of meal I’d be very happy to eat.
Thank you! It’s really pretty easy to make. The only possible challenging thing in this preparation process is to roll the dough thin enough. And even that is conquered after you do it a couple of times. Everything else in this recipe is a breeze.
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Hi Julia! This looks AMAZING! I’ll have to make this soon. Thanks for linking up to Marvelous Mondays. I’d live to have you as a cohost. Please email me with the date you would like to co-host. thisgalcooks@gmail.com
This looks amazing! I’ve made homemade pasta, but never ravioli because filling it seemed like a daunting task. I’m going to have to check into getting one of those molds, it looks so much easier. And they are so darn cute!
This device makes filling ravioli a breeze! It secures the edges, you don’t have to think about the size and the shape of your ravioli. I love it! Like I mention in the recipe, it is important to roll your dough really thinly to successfully use this ravioli mold.
Vibrant and delicious I know. GREG
fabulous… and love the colours, its calling out Summer food to me… which is soon
I’m speechless!
This is one of the best post I’ve seen lately!:)
This dish looks unbelievably appetizing, and it’s definitely calling my name
Thank you for your sweet comment!
Thank you so much for the step by step detailed recipe. I’ve got to try making ravioli from scratch sometime
The beautiful thing about making your own ravioli is the endless variety of fillings using whole and natural ingredients. I control what goes into my ravioli!
This ravioli looks amazing and so beautiful! I love that you made it from scratch! LOVE this!
Now I am thinking what kind of filling I should make next.
Love love love ravioli but I have never tried to make it from scratch out of sheer laziness. Yours looks divine and I’ve been wanting to make a fresh tomato sauce. I recently made one out of canned plum tomatoes but it just isn’t the same. Lovely dish.
Thank you! Yes, freshly made tomato sauce beats sauce made from canned tomatoes each time, even though some tomato based pasta sauces are pretty good these days.
Hi Julia!
Just stopping by to let you know that I will be featuring this recipe on my blog this weekend. Thanks again for sharing on Marvelous Mondays. If you would like to co-host soon, let me know which date will work best for you.
Have a great weekend!
Julie
Oh my these look heavenly! I’ve only made homemade pasta once before, but I’m thinking I need to attempt it again. The whole recipe sounds amazing. I’ve never seen a ravioli mold before, that’s awesome!
Wow this looks absolutely amazing. Your pictures so colorful – it’s making my mouth water! I may have to give this recipe a try this weekend
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This ravioli looks like absolute perfection! I could eat a big bowl full of this right now
(and I adore your blog, adding you to my Google Reader
)
Thank you! I loved your blog and will be visiting yours more, as well!
And again, what a cute name for a blog – Cooking Actress!!!
Hi Jules!! been looking for ages for this kind of recipe and so happy i found it and sorry if i am being a numpty but how many people does this serve? i hope you get this in time, in the UK so hope the time line is working in my favour!!
cheers Emma
I think I made 24 raviolis using this mold, and it resulted in about 4-5 servings. I am planning to make another ravioli recipe pretty soon, and will post clarification about how many it will serve.
I literally just made pasta dough to make ravioli’s. I googled a search for spinach/cheese filling and found yours! I do own the ravioli mold-which is wonderful to have!!! I’m gonna try your spinach/cheese filling and cream sauce for tonight’s dinner!!!
Glad to have you stop by! Hope your ravioli comes out great! Spinach is such a great ingredient for ravioli filling.
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I have this mold, and it’s never been used. Now, I know where to get started. Great tutorial and beautiful dish. I can see why this has been pinned a lot!
Thank you!
I am making this recipe and I was wondering if I could store the dough overnight?
Yes, you could refrigerate the pasta dough overnight, and when you’re ready to use it, let it sit on the counter for about 30 minutes, allowing it to get to the room temperature. However, you can’t store the pasta dough in the refrigerator for longer, because it will turn unappealing gray color.
Julia: Your recipes look great..just wanted you to know that your images have broken links and are not displaying.
Chris – thanks for stopping by! I just checked this post and all of my images are displaying. Are you talking about my other posts? If so, could you let me know which post does not display the images? Thank you!