I am perpetually looking for semolina. I adore making homemade pasta. When I lived near Bob's Red Mill and readily available 25 pound bags of semolina? I made pasta constantly. Now that I live in middle America, though? It's incredibly difficult to track down. I can find a pound or so at a time. Which, while being enough to actually make pasta, isn't exactly enough to make a lot of pasta. Especially at the affordable price that I'm used to! Nevertheless, I decided to wander on over to the local Italian grocery store. They did indeed have semolina, albeit not in a quantity or price point that I want to spend every day. Although, for the occasional treat, I'm willing splurge. And today is definitely that day. Hence the Saffron Brigante Ravioli.
It's not exactly a special occasion. Really, I'm just getting over having covid for the first time and have finally come to the startling realization that I am actually hungry enough to eat again. Although that's as good an excuse as any! I also picked up a saffron brigante cheese, which looks absolutely delicious. I'd never had saffron brigante before. It's a mild sheep's cheese with saffron and black peppercorns. It's predominantly found on illustrious cheese boards. But I came across the brightly colored cheese and thought that it would go great with freshly squeezed lemon and ricotta. So, here we are making ravioli!
Gallery
Variations of Brigante Ravioli
I haven't made homemade pasta in what seems like ages. I made it for my birthday last year and didn't blog it because some special occasions are meant to be savored in the moment. Plus, coordinating people and children at someone else's house makes for quite the exciting culinary day, anyway! Although I do frequently make all sorts of store bought pasta concoctions. As fun as it is to make the noodles yourself, sometimes the quicker and easier way is the way that I'm going to go. You can always make your own noodles, though, and substitute them into the recipe. One of my favorite things to make is homemade linguini macaroni and cheese.
This Brigante Ravioli recipe consists of homemade semolina and egg pasta, ricotta, lemon zest, olive oil, and freshly grated saffron brigante cheese. Saffron brigante with black peppercorns isn't necessarily the easiest cheese to find, though! So, feel free to substitute parmesan. When I ran out of it, I also just sprinkled freshly grated parmesan on top of it at the end and that was delicious as well. Really, you can substitute any cheese of choice here. There are a wide variety of cheeses that go perfectly well with lemon ricotta and a splash of olive oil. I'd like to say that it's a "classic" flavor profile. Although I'm not entirely sure that anything in this is classic? Fresh, homemade pasta does have its own particular warm, fuzzy feeling, though. Maybe it's just the nostalgia and cheese speaking.
1/2c.brigante w/ saffron(or parmesan cheese) plus more for garnish
1egg
1lemonzested
dashsalt
dashpepper
Pasta
7ravioliper serving
dasholive oil
1/4c.brigante w/ saffron(or parmesan cheese)
dashsalt
dashpepper
Instructions
Ravioli
On a large flat countertop, make a mound of semolina and all-purpose flour. Create a crater in the middle. Add eggs, olive oil, and salt.
Mix together by hand, kneading dough toward the center, for 2 minutes, or until the dough begins to stick together. Knead for 15 minutes, or until the dough is soft and elastic. If the dough begins to dry out, add small amounts of water, 1/2 teaspoon at a time, and continue to knead.
Cover with plastic wrap and let rest for 1 hour.
Filling
Add all of the filling ingredients to a bowl and mix to combine.
Add a little bit of flour to a countertop or large flat surface and roll out dough until about 1/4-inch thick. The dough should be 3-4 inches wide, so either keep in one piece that wide or cut into strips.
Press each strip through the pasta machine at the highest setting twice. On my pasta machine, this is setting number 7.
Press the strips through the medium (5) and small (2) settings.
Cut into equal-sized squares, circles, or triangles. There are stamps and molds that can make this a little bit easier to do. Although it can be done by hand or even with cookie cutters.
Add a dollop of filling to the center of half of the ravioli squares (the second half is the top piece).
Lightly wet the edges of the ravioli. I did this was a spray bottle. Although you can also dip your finger in a glass of water and run it along the edges of the pasta.
While the dough is slightly damp, press the top piece onto the bottom pieces of ravioli with the filling. You want to press pretty firmly because this is what keeps the filling inside of the dough while cooking.You want the ravioli to be fairly full. Otherwise, there will be too high a pasta-to-filling ratio.
Let dry for 15-30 minutes.
Cook
Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil.
Put pasta into the pot and return to a boil. Cook for 10 minutes, or until the pasta is soft enough to eat.The exact cooking time will vary depending on how dry the pasta is, so it's best to check it frequently. If the pasta isn't rolled out thin enough, it will also take extra time to cook.
Remove from heat and strain.
Sprinkle with additional saffron brigante and/or parmesan cheese. I ended up liking the balance that a little extra parmesan added. Although this is entirely personal preference! Top with salt, pepper, and a dash of olive oil.
Tips, Tricks, & Notes
For more information on making your own pasta dough, I have an entire article on: The Fundamentals of Semolina Pasta Dough. Including how to make your own without a pasta maker or any other specialty equipment.
This Page Contains Edited Images
As a general rule, I don't like to edit my images and I am firmly against alteration of images in food blogs. It's not something that we generally think about when it comes to recipes. But food styling, editing, alteration, and even faking entirely is just as rampant a problem in the recipe realm as anything else! Cooking is a very visual art and you can tell when a lot of foods are cooked based on the color. So, when this is altered and you can't use the coloration as a gauge, it makes it quite difficult to follow some recipes. I have an entire article about Food Styling and Unrealistic Expectations of Recipes.
Because of this, I try very hard not to alter any of my photos. I like to take photos with natural sunlight during the day. Ordinarily this is very true to color and I don't edit the photos at all. However, since my place is very warm with a lot of yellow lighting, sometimes my camera overcompensates and ends up with an unnatural blue tone. In the following images on this page, I adjusted the levels and hue to try and make this more true to color. In the interest of transparency, these are the before and after photos.
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