Italian Food Recipes

Artichokes are vegetables typical of the spring period and it seems that they traditionally comes from Liguria as this delicious Italian first course. Artichokes can be used for any type of Italian recipes like “Torta Pasqualina” that is a sort of pie or as a side dish here I use them to prepare the stuffing of these delicious ravioli. In this recipe artichokes are mix with ricotta cheese, Parmesan, parsley and marjoram. The seasoning of this first course is simply made with butter and sage, but if you prefer you can also prepare a sort of cream with walnuts.

INGREDIENTS (for 8 people):
FOR THE DOUGH:
600 g of Flour
2 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
2 Eggs
Salt
8 Tablespoons of warm water
FOR THE STUFFING:
9 Artichokes
250 g of Ricotta Cheese
1 / 2 Onion
1 Lemon
1 Egg
40 g of Parmesan
3 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
40 g of butter
Some leaf of sage
Parsley
Marjoram
Salt
Black Pepper

PREPARATION TIME: 1 hour

COOKING TIME: 20 minutes

WINE: Vermentino dei Colli di Luni Lambruschi (White Wine)

PREPARATION
Start with the preparation of the dough: place in a bowl the flour, the eggs, the water, the extra virgin olive oil and some salt,

mix all the ingredients until you obtain an homogeneous dough. Cover the dough with a sheet of film


an let it stand for about 20 minutes. In the meantime prepare the stuffing: clean the artichokes, remove the hard external leafs and peel the stems in order to use the tender internal part; cut in thin slice the artichokes and the stems and place them in a bowl with water and the lemon to not blacken them.

When the artichokes are ready, preheat the extra virgin olive oil in a pan with thin slices of the onion, then add the artichokes and cook them for about 10 – 15 minutes.


When the artichokes are ready, cut them in small pieces and place them in a bowl, add the ricotta cheese, the egg, the Parmesan, come parsley, some marjoram, salt and black pepper and mix all together.

Let salted water boil for pasta. With the help of a rolling pin roll out the dough to obtain a thin long pastry like this shown in the picture below. Place with a teaspoon some stuffing on the centre of the pastry,


then close the pastry over the stuffing and with a wheel for cutting the pasta cut the ravioli.




When water boils place in it the ravioli and cook them for about 7 – 8 minutes in the meantime melt the butter in a pan with the sage,


drain ravioli with a skimmer, place them in a dish and pour on them the butter, sprinkle with some parmesan and serve hot.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!

This is the typical first course that my family prepares for the Christmas day. In particular these ravioli are handmade by my grandmother, which is native of Salerno (Campania) in the southern part of Italy. The main characteristic of these ravioli is their dimension: indeed they are so much big that three or four of them are enough to be replete. Their stuffing is very good: it is made of minced meat of veal, minced meat of pork, provolone (typical Italian cheese), ricotta (typical Italian cheese), Parmesan (typical Italian cheese), eggs, raw ham and loaf. They are dress with the sauce of capon stuffed. I will write the recipe of capon stuffed in the next day.

INGREDIENTS FOR DOUGH (for 10 people)
900 g of Flour
7 Eggs
Salt

INGREDIENTS FOR THE STUFFING
350 g of minced meat of veal
350 g of minced meat of pork
100 g of Raw ham
400 g of Ricotta (Italian Cheese)
100 g of Provolone (Italian Cheese)
1 Loaf
2 Eggs
1 / 2 Glass of milk
70 g of Parmesan
3- 4 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
Salt
Pepper

PREPARATION TIME: 1 hour

COOKING TIME: 15 minutes

WINE: Costa d’Amalfi (Red Wine)

PREPARATION
In a pan preheat the extra virgin olive oil, add the minced meat of veal and the minced meat of pork and let them cook for about 5 minutes,

then move them in a bowl and let them cool. Blend in a mixer the raw ham and add it in the bowl.

Then blend also the provolone and add it to the meat and the raw ham together with the Parmesan, the ricotta, the eggs, salt, pepper, and mix.

Dip and crumble the loaf in the milk and add it to the mixture.

Mix all the ingredients and the stuffing of ravioli is ready.

Now prepare the dough for ravioli.
Place the flour as a fountain on a table, then sprinkle with salt, add the eggs and knead

until you obtain an homogeneous dough. Let it stand for about 30 minutes.


With a rolling pan, roll the dough out on a worktop sprinkled with flour to a sheet of thin thick. Now with the help of a glass cut the pastry in discs as shown in the picture below.


Each raviolo is made of two discs of pastry one below and one over. Place the discs of the pastry on a worktop sprinkled with flour and put in the middle of them one teaspoons of the stuffing.

Then cover the stuffing with another disc and with the help of a fork close the border.


Let salted water boil, add the ravioli and cook them for 10 – 12 minutes,

then drain them. Place three or four ravioli on a platter, as you desired, and pour the sauce over them. Serve hot and if you want add some parmesan.
This is the result:

BUON APPETITO!