Cypriot Halloumi Ravioles and Italian Spinach and Ricotta Ravioli Recipe
This is a wonderfully easy recipe to make Cypriot Ravioles and Italian Spinach and Ricotta Ravioli.
The Cypriot Halloumi Ravioles are pockets of pasta dough thinly rolled filled with a mixture of grated halloumi cheese, the best quality ricotta cheese you can find and aromatic dried mint. This pasta dough is a cross between a Chinese dumpling wrapper and an Italian egg pasta dough. We add water to the dough as you would with a dumpling and add eggs as the Italians do. You end up with a silky texture that I think is quite unique to these ravioles. You can also use your favourite pasta recipe instead.
My Yiayia and a friend used to cook together and when they did they went into production mode, they would make a hundred filling a 12 seater dining room table. The Ravioles filled with halloumi and ricotta were homemade and her convenience food. Stored in her chest freezer when her arthritis would flare up, she would add a few to boiling stock and eat them as you would a wonton soup in winter. Or in summer my Yiayia would melt butter to a nutty brown colour, spoon over a few tablespoons and sprinkle on grated halloumi, delicious.
The ravioles have a very subtle flavour of halloumi and mint. They are a great addition, and are delicious, to your usual pasta meal. We made 84 a few broke when we filled them, the dough was rolled a little too thinly but we ate them all. If we had more time and freezer space we could have doubled the recipe and frozen the raviolis on greaseproof paper, and then transfered them to a bag, to be enjoyed as a convenience meal in the future.
My daughter’s uni is located next to Borough Market and whenever I have a meeting I arrange to see her for a coffee (our favourite places are Flor or Rabot 1745 owned by Hotel Chocolat) or if she hasn’t had lunch, we usually head to the top of the Shard and have a drink and bar snacks at Hutong. If she has more time and she needs something more substantial we pop to Padella for delicious pasta. It is known to be one of the best pasta places in the UK, the first mouthful of our spinach ravioli took us to our lunches at Padella. Food is such a wonderful trigger to your memories. So many parts of your brain are engaged in every mouthful and with one bite or fragrant aroma, you are back in a place where you created that memory.
The Spinach and Ricotta ravioli were outstanding due to the ingredients I have indoors. When you are dealing with a few ingredients in a recipe you really need to make sure that the ingredients are the best you can afford. I buy Parmigiano Reggiano Red Cow from Bianca and Mora in Borough Market The ricotta was Galbani’s and it was very good.
Dough for Ravioles
- Dough
- 3 cups plain/cake flour
- 3 eggs
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- +- ¼-1/2 cup of water
- Machine
- Fit the dough hook to your mixer.
- Add all the ingredients except the water.
- Mix and with a gentle stream add the water, slowly and waiting for the drops to incorporate.
- Add enough water to make a smooth, dough that it not sticky.
- Knead the dough on low speed until the surface appears glossy and smooth, about 5 minutes.
- Cover with a dish towel and let the dough rest for at least an hour.
Halloumi Filling for Ravioles
- use 1 block of halloumi (225g) using 1 cup of the grated halloumi in the filling and the balance for sprinkling over the top finished dish
- 1 whole egg
- ½ cup excellent quality ricotta cheese
- 1 teaspoon mint or more to taste
- To serve:
- ¼ cup brown butter, melted and allowed to cook until brown
- Grated halloumi
- Mix and set aside ready to fill you pasta rounds or any shape you choose to make.
- This amount will make about 40 ravioles filled with a teaspoonful of the mixture.
Spinach and Ricotta Ravioli Filling
- 200g cooked spinach finely chopped and squeezed
- 125g ricotta cheese
- 90g parmesan
- 1 egg
- 1 clove garlic crushed
- sprinkling of nutmeg
- salt and pepper to taste#
- Mix together and set aside.
