Cooking Challenge: Homemade Pasta 4

We had a fantastic holiday weekend between our trip into NYC on Friday and our neighbor's barbeque yesterday. We topped it off by having a perfect afternoon visit with our Aunt & Uncle while the boys enjoyed playing in the pool where they live. I love 3 day weekends!

We decided on the way home that today would be the day I'd attempt ravioli. So, we made a quick stop off for a couple of ingredients for the filling - ricotta cheese and sweet turkey sausage. When we got home I decided to work on the filling first because I wanted the sausage to cool a bit before adding it to the ravioli.

I am still using the pasta dough recipe that Judy at No Fear Entertaining shared with me when I first began this challenge. It's so simple and I'm sure soon I'll just be throwing it together without thinking about it.

From Family, Friends and Food

Once I had the dough rolled out nice and thin using my Kitchenaid pasta roller, I placed some of the filling along each sheet. I used a scallopped pastry cutter to cut each piece after I layed a second sheet on top of the first. After I separated each one, I dampened my finger with a bit of water to seal the two pieces together. Then, I used the pastry cutter to make pretty edges on each one.

From Family, Friends and Food

They turned out pretty well for a first reall attempt. Next time I will change a few things though. The filling was tasty, but needed something more to bind it together so I'll adjust the ingredients before sharing that recipe. The other thing I would change is the size of the ravioli. They ended up pretty large because the sheets came out wide and I didn't think to cut them in half when I was working with them.

From Family, Friends and Food

I keep learning more about the process of making homemade pasta and really do enjoy the process of working with the dough.

I'm submitting this to Presto Pasta Nights which is being hosted by Graziana of Erbe in Cucina. Be sure to head on over there on Friday to see a full round-up of everything pasta this week!