Riccotta and Spinach Ravioli

I'm an avid fan of a UK show on cable called 'Come Dine With Me.' The show is recorded in several countries, UK, Ireland, Australia and South Africa. A group of people are hosting dinner parties at each other's residences, then score each other on the food and the dinner party in general. There are plenty of human failings on show but also interesting dinner menus. On one of those dinners, in South Africa, the lady prepared spinach and ricotta ravioli. I thought, how difficult can that be? Admittedly, she had a machine to roll the pasta dough, which I have not, so out came the old rolling pin, which itself is an heirloom from Diane's mum and must be a hundred years old. But it still works.

So, I mixed plain flour, an egg and salt and started kneading, folding and rolling by hand until I had the dough pretty thin. Unfortunately the blogger wasn't at hand to take photos of that procedure, but you get the picture.

With a glass the right shape, I stamped the dough into circles

From our own garden, I cut some spinach and after steaming it I diced it and mixed it with ricotta cheese to make the filling.

It's a bit of a fiddly job to get the amount right so the ravioli don't split for being over full.

Then I wet the edge with a little milk, folded the ravioli in half and sealed the edges with a fork.

Into salted boiling water for about 8 minutes, stirring occasionally.

To serve, I made a tomato sauce using a tin of diced basil and garlic tomato and a tub of tomato puree together with herbed spices and the trusty Maggi seasoning which I use in just about everything (except maybe ice cream).

The end result, a beautiful pasta meal for the blogger and me. Bon Appetito..