Solving the ravioli ...no-stickee...problem. I finally called around to find another shop

M

Marg CDN

Well-known member
that would make the ravioli sheets. They told me that they are not only thinner, but also wetter than lasagne sheets, as they would not stick otherwise. I sure know about that.

This city is said to have the largest population of Italians in the world, other than Rome. Somewhere there has to be a source for this.

This shop produces the sheets only for restuarants and although she offered to make some for me, I suggested that she just call me the next time she gets an order. I'm actually excited about trying this now.

I suppose I could make my own but wouldn't you think that in this city, one could find them close by?

 
It's a dying art

It doesn't surprise me at all that you're having a hard time locating sources for this. Good that you've found at least one though. You're in Toronto? I can't think of any place here to buy except maybe a couple or old small Italian restaurants, and I think it's all they can do to keep up making what they need. BTW, anyone coming through Cincinnati and looking for a fun and unusual place to eat should try Scotti's on Vine at Court by the Kroger building. It's been there since the early 20th C and the family is still there making pasta and handmade canolli! Although the older generation no longer are in the restuarant and it's lost a lot of color as a result. But it's still the same old-fashioned menu and heavy on the garlic. They have the best garlic bread I've ever had, including all of my previous attempts at it. It's a grilled olive oil and chunks of garlic on slabs of crusty Italian bread creation. It is majorly addictive.

 
I make my own ravioli sheets with a very simple hand cranked pasta maker. Making the sheets is

the easiest part of making ravioli so I don't understand why you'd want to buy them. In fact my parents made them with only a rolling pin.

 
I agree, with a food processor for the doll and a pasta roller, you can have sheets with less effort

than it takes to go shopping.

Forming the ravioli is a pesky task either way.

 
OK. I"ll believe you guys. I do have the roller, but it just seems that I spend waaay too much of

my life in the kitchen and the more I do, the more that is expected of me. I'm just a bit out of balance right now, I believe.

And I have the pasta maker that was on TV years ago...my mom bought for me.

Friends think that it is overly ambitious just to stuff the ravioli.

Oh dear, now I just thought of a way to use the wonderful-looking special can of crab in my frig.

 
BTW...if I'm going through Cinncinati, I'll be looking for Richard's Austrian Empire, not Scotti's.

 
I can SO relate to time in the kitchen vs. expectations vs...

balance in life. When I start feeling like a scullery maid in a Dickens novel, I call a general work stoppage and strike and place orders for take away from selected food establishments. I just finished with one of those and am now ready to face the supermarket once again. ; )

 
although she's still a bit thin, she's fully recouped and sassy . thanks for asking smileys/smile.gif

 
Marg, are you in Toronto? There must be a shop in

Woodbridge (never been there myself though it sounds like a mecca for Ital ingredients). Or phone Grano restaurant and see if they can recommend someone. There's a store near Grano, 2021 Yonge, La Salumeria, I'm told they have everything. Or try Diana, 1299 St. Clair West, another mecca, so I've heard.

That said, if you DO feel like making your own, I find it easier and cleaner in a stand mixer than a processor, and the recipe I use for stuffed pastas adds 1/4 cup white wine to 1 1/2 cups flour -- I've found the wine makes the pasta A LOT easier to roll (I do it by hand, never really liked using the machine) and manage, and it looks like, with your discovery, the secret to no-stick. (And here I thought I had magic spit!)

 
Not having the magic of your spit on hand, it did sound like a good idea to make the

dough wetter. Thanks for the resource list. Woodbridge is not all that far from me but I don't venture (way over) to Yonge.

IS the wine addition your own discovery?

 
shaun, is the recipe only white wine and flour? must be some egg? would you mind sharing smileys/smile.gif

 
Not my own recipe, no ...

It's from that Italian cookbook I keep raving about here, there, and everywhere -- Piano, Piano, Pieno: Authentic Food from a Tuscan Farm. She has a basic pasta recipe as well, just flour and egg, but also some variations, with chestnut flour and buckwheat flour, and chocolate (cocoa actually, delicious with game sauces), red wine ("Fresh Pasta Drunk on Chianti"). Here's the recipe I use even for straightforward fettuccine and things, because I like its pliability and smoothness and it rolls out so nice and thin. It's for Panzarotti al Sugo di Noce, or Pasta Stuffed with Greens and Herbs in a Walnut Sauce.

200 g (1-1/2 scant cups) all-purpose flour
1 large egg
1/4 cup white wine
2 tsp extra virgin olive oil

You can make this the traditional way, with the ring of flour and the liquids in the middle, or knead in the mixer, with the dough hook, for 6 to 8 minutes. Either way, it should rest, covered, for half an hour or so before rolling.

 
Homemade dough is so much better that I'd use the ravioli filling just between

layers of dough, like lasagna. If you really want ravioli, forget the molds and fancy equipment and just dot the top edge of the sheet of dough, about 2 inches from the top (depending on how big you want them) and then fold it over and seal between each ravioli, cut off and repeat. You get free form ravioli with wide edges of pasta which I like. Recipe: 2c flour, 3 eggs, tablespoon or so of water if needed. I use my food processor and hand pasta machine.

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top