Ricotta Cavatelli

In my previous post (here), I shared a recipe for homemade ricotta. Let’s now use fresh ricotta to make cavatelli with a BeeBo cavatelli maker.

I own two hand-cranked cavatelli machines: a vintage BeeBo and a Demetra. In my opinion, the BeeBo bests the Demetra. The Demetra features a sturdy build but, in my experience, its suction cup foot often fails to secure the machine even to a clean and flat stainless-steel work counter.

My BeeBo came with a small recipe booklet. I didn’t pay attention to it for years. However, while researching ricotta cavatelli recipes, I learned that a number of talented chefs swear by the BeeBo’s ricotta dough recipe.  Frank Falcinelli and Frank Castronovo in their The Frankies Spuntino Kitchen Companion & Cooking Manual (2010) write “[o]ur [ricotta] cavatelli recipe—which we learned from the pamphlet in the BeeBo box—is on page 100.”

In Pasta By Hand (2015), Jenn Louis introduces her ricotta cavatelli recipe as follows:

“This Italian dumpling is one of the first I learned how to make. One year, my husband bought me a hand-crank cavatelli machine for my birthday. We now use that machine at Lincoln, and it has been repaired and rewelded twice because it gets so much use! The recipe for ricotta cavatelli in the booklet that was included with the machine yields perfectly tender and flavorful dumplings.”

Here’s Louis’s take on the BeeBo ricotta cavatelli recipe.  I include her instructions for using a stand mixer and I offer some BeeBo-specific recommendations. 

500 g / 3½ cups + 1 tbsp all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting

1 tsp kosher salt

480 g / 2 cups whole-milk ricotta cheese, homemade or store-bought

55 g / ¼ cup whole milk

1 egg

Sauce of your choice (suggestions follow)

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment, combine the flour, salt, ricotta, milk, and egg. Knead on medium speed for 10 minutes, until fully combined and the dough is mostly smooth. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let rest at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and dust with flour.

Uncover the dough and place it on a work surface lightly dusted with flour. Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough to approximately ¼-inch thickness. As best you can, square off the sides of the dough sheet to form a rectangle. Cut the dough into strips approximately ½-inch wide.

Attach your cavatelli machine to a sturdy work surface. Feed the dough strips into the machine by cranking the machine’s handle. Cavatelli will fall out of the machine’s round head onto your work surface. Put the cavatelli on the prepared baking sheets and shape the remaining dough. Make sure that the cavatelli don’t touch or they will stick together. After processing all of the dough, Louis writes that you should have enough ricotta cavatelli to serve 8.

To store, refrigerate on the baking sheets, covered with plastic wrap, for up to 2 days, or freeze on the baking sheets and transfer to an airtight container. Use within 1 month. Do not thaw before cooking.

To cook, bring a large pot filled with generously salted water to a simmer over medium-high heat. Add the cavatelli and simmer until they float to the surface, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove immediately with a slotted spoon and finish with your choice of sauce. Serve right away.

Louis recommends pairing ricotta cavatelli with these traditional sauces (recipes that Louis shares in Cooking By Hand): pesto; tomato sauce; guanciale, tomato, and red onion; brown butter with sage; fonduta; gorgonzola cream sauce; liver, pancetta, and porcini ragú; rabbit ragú; lamb ragú; or beef ragú. 

I frequently sauce ricotta cavatelli with leftover meat and braising liquid from a previous meal. A favorite combination includes chopped meat from chicken thighs braised in stock with sliced artichoke hearts and porcini mushrooms.

Making cavatelli with a BeeBo is so easy. Through experience I found that the key to crafting perfectly formed cavatelli with a BeeBo is rolling and cutting the strips of dough to just the right thickness and width. I find that the sweet spot is a dough strip that is approximately ¼-inch thick and ½-inch wide. But, don’t worry, even misshaped cavatelli taste great.

A couple of final notes. The BeeBo ricotta cavatelli recipe easily scales up and down. I often halve Louis’s recipe to feed 4. And I find that a stacking set of gyoza trays work really well when storing pasta. Three of these trays easily accommodates over one pound of cavatelli.

Homemade Ricotta

In the Encyclopedia of Pasta (2009), Oretta Zanini De Vita writes about cavatelli:

“[t]hese small masterpieces of pasta sculpture, which resemble little hats, immediately evoke Puglia, even if now they are typical of all the regions of the south, where they have acquired different names and are treated to different sauces. Their name derives from the curious shape obtained with skilled hands from a dough always made from durum wheat.” 

Today pasta makers use a broad range of wheat flour—from weak to strong—to craft cavatelli. Recently I mixed fine cloth-bolted pastry flour from Anson Mills with 00 flour with the aim of making a soft textured cavatelli. I have combined stoneground Sonora, a soft white winter flour, with extra fancy (aka fine) durum to create a chewier cavatelli. But the cavatelli dough that I run through my BeeBo cavatelli machine the most—at least lately—blends homemade ricotta and all-purpose flour. This post covers how I make ricotta. A follow-up post will share how I make ricotta cavatelli using a BeeBo cavatelli machine.

Homemade Ricotta

Making ricotta at home can be fast and easy. I employ a very simple method that takes around ½ hour to produce a cream-rich ricotta. I learned the technique during a pasta making course that I took back in 2011 from Thomas McNaughton, the chef/owner of flour + water in San Francisco’s Mission District. I’ve since tweaked his class recipe based upon a 2015 San Francisco Chronicle article about McNaughton’s ricotta. 

8 cups whole milk

1 cup heavy cream

1 tablespoon kosher salt

¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

Place a colander inside a larger bowl, line the colander with cheesecloth, and set aside. Slowly bring the milk, cream, and salt to simmer in a heavy 6-quart pot over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes.

When the milk barely begins to simmer (about 180 to 200°F), add the lemon juice. Stir constantly until the mixture starts to curdle, about 4 more minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat. Do not simmer the milk after the curds begin to separate or the curds will become dense and dry. Allow the curds to rest for 10 minutes.

Pour the milk mixture into the lined colander to strain. The milk will have already formed hard curds — ricotta cheese. You can use it after 5 minutes because not much more moisture will be extracted by further draining.

An instant thermometer tells you when to combine the lemon juice and dairy. I add the lemon juice—or whatever acidic mixture I decide to use—when the dairy reaches 195°F.

I make another slight deviation from McNaughton’s recipe: instead of pouring the mixture into the colander, I lift the curds out of the pot with a stainless-steel spider strainer and place them in the cheesecloth-lined colander to drain for about 20 minutes.

I have a Breville/PolyScience Induction Range that I like to use when I make ricotta. The induction range uses its probe’s temperature reading to heat the milk and cream to exactly 195°F. I select the machine’s low intensity heat setting with probe control and insert the probe into the dairy mixture. The machine sounds when the dairy reaches 195°F and I stir in my acid. In my experience, the curds form very quickly.

My notes from McNaughton’s class read that any clear acid—lemon juice, white wine vinegar, even white wine—will work to make ricotta. Once I even tried powdered citric acid mixed with a splash of water. Typically, however, I use a mixture of almost 4 tablespoons lemon juice with a splash of champagne vinegar.

The method I use is by no means the only way to make ricotta at home. Other techniques, even though more involved, also work to produce different textures of ricotta.

In Classic Techniques of Italian Cooking (1982), Giuliano Bugialli’s recipe stirs lemon juice into milk, lets the mixture stand for 36 hours in a cool place, then adds yogurt. Bring the contents to a boil for 1 minute. Pour the product into a colander lined with heavy cheesecloth to drain for 1 hour. He writes: “[t]his is the authentically dry unsalted ricotta which is to be used as a binding ingredient. It does not have a rich flavor in itself.”

In The Splendid Table (1992), Lynne Rossetto Kasper presents another method to make a creamier ricotta. Her recipe warms milk, cream and lemon juice to 170°F over medium-low heat. This, she writes, can take 40 minutes. Then turn up the heat to medium to bring the mixture to 205° to 208°F. Turn off the heat, let rest for 10 minutes then turn the mixture into a cheesecloth-lined colander to drain for 15 minutes.

Cavatelli Revisited

In a previous post I shared a recipe for making cavatelli with a hand-cranked pasta machine called a BeeBo. This recipe used a dough made with durum flour, eggs, oil and salt. Oretta Zanini De Vita writes in her Encyclopedia of Pasta [2009] that this particular dough is used to make pincinelle, a regional version of cavatelli found around Pesaro in the Marche.

(A quick aside. The inhabitants of Colonna in the province of Rome also make a fresh pasta called pincinelle. But do not worry about confusing Colonna’s version with Pesaro’s—they look nothing alike. Colonna’s pincinelle resembles a fresh bucatini (i.e., long, thin, and hollow) while Pesaro’s pincinelle looks like a little rolled gnocchi.)

Although the cavatelli made with eggs and oil in the Marche is authentic, it does not represent cavatelli’s standard which is made with only durum flour and water. If you want to try a traditional cavatelli and, at the same time, expand your cavatelli maker’s repertoire, I offer the following recipe for a flour and water dough.

• 300 grams Giusto's Extra Fancy durum flour
• Approximately 10 tablespoons cold water

1) Weigh out the flour and sift it into a large mixing bowl.

2) Make a well in the flour. Add just enough cold water into the flour with a fork until a crumbly dough forms.

3) Clean the dough off of your fork and add this dough to the bowl.

4) Holding the bowl with one hand, reach into the bowl with your other hand and continue to mix the dough by hand. In small increments, add as much of the cold water as needed to incorporate all of the flour in the bowl into a rough dough that holds together.

5) Turn your dough onto a clean work surface. Wash your hands to remove any dough before kneading.

6) If necessary, lightly dust your work surface. Knead the dough until smooth; this can take a full 10 minutes or more.

7) Lightly flour the dough and wrap it in plastic. Let the dough rest on the counter for 20 minutes.

8) Unwrap the dough and lightly dust it with flour. With a rolling pin, roll the dough out to a 3/8-inch thickness. As best you can, square off the sides of the dough sheet to form a square. Cut the dough lengthwise into 1/2-inch to 3/4-inch wide strips.

9) Attach your cavatelli machine to a sturdy work surface. Feed the dough strips into the machine by cranking the machine’s handle. Cavatelli will fall out of the machine’s round head onto your work surface. Lightly dust the cavatelli with flour to prevent them from sticking together and spread them out on a floured board. After feeding through all of the dough, you should have approximately 1 pound of cavatelli.

Cook these cavatelli in the same way as was you would the Marche version. Heat a large pot full of salty water to a boil. Add the cavatelli. After you add the pasta, the boil may slow or disappear. Mix the pasta in the water to help prevent the pasta from sticking together. After the water has returned to a full boil for approximately 3 minutes, start testing the cavatelli. The pasta is ready when it loses its raw taste. It should be chewy but not gummy. Drain the pasta into a colander and shake the colander to remove excess water. Add the cavatelli into your ready sauce and cook the two together for a minute or so.

The BeeBo makes short work of creating fresh pasta. Of the handmade pasta makers that I currently own (a torchio da bigoli, an Imperia 220 Manual and a BeeBo), the BeeBo processes a pound of dough into a ready-to-use shape in the least amount of time. (The torchio comes in a close second depending upon the die used.)

Cavatelli

This is the third in a series of posts on making fresh pasta. Using Oretta Zanini De Vita’s Encyclopedia of Pasta [2009] as our guide, we started our survey of shapes, dough and techniques by examining two pastas with Northern Italian origins: pappardelle and toppe. Both of these pastas are simple, flat noodles. Pappardelle is made with all-purpose flour while toppe is made with a tipo 00/durum flour blend. We now turn our focus from the north to the south where durum wheat is the prevalent flour for making pasta. We also transition from making flat noodles to creating sculpted pasta. A classic sculpted, durum wheat pasta from Southern Italy is cavatelli.

Historians believe that Arabs introduced the cultivation of durum wheat to Italy by way of Sicily in the 9th century. Durum thrived in Southern Italy’s soil and climate and a burgeoning dried pasta industry followed. The area around Naples became a leader in this new trade. Cities on the Amalfi Coast had a warm climate and salt air breezes that were ideal for drying pasta. The region also had access to excellent quality durum critical to making dried pastas, especially those with extruded shapes.

Zanini De Vita describes cavatelli as resembling little hats. The shape has approximately forty different names used across seven Southern Italian regions. (My favorite of these names is orecchie di prete or priest’s ears.) Not surprisingly, cavatelli also comes in a number of different shapes and sizes. One common cavatelli shape is made when a small (3/8-inch wide), pencil-thin cylinder of dough is drawn across a board with a blunt-tipped knife. A variation is created when a finger or two (or more) replace the knife.

Making cavatelli is a lot of fun, but mastering some of the shapes takes practice and time.  Although wooden boards are by far the most common work surface, once again, variations exist. Campania’s parmarieddo is made by rolling the dough across the palm of a hand instead of a board. Basilicata’s orecchie di prete is made by rolling the dough across a grooved wooden board called a cavarola.

Another common cavatelli form is machine-made and resembles a small, thin, ridged gnocchi. (Cavatelli is often generically referred to as gnocchetti.) A hard dough is rolled out and cut into strips. These strips are fed into a cavatelli maker. With a turn of a handle, the pasta is shaped and cut into cavatelli. With practice you can transform 450 grams (approximately 1 pound) of dough into cavatelli in less than 5 minutes.

Traditionally cavatelli is made only with durum flour and cold water. (Here's a link to a recipe for a flour and water dough I recently posted.) Alternative regional dough recipes exist. Here is one that I developed for my cavatelli machine, which is called a BeeBo. This dough recipe is based upon an egg and olive oil version from the Marche.

• 300 grams Giusto's Extra Fancy durum flour
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• Sea salt
• Approximately 4 tablespoons cold water

1) Weigh out the flour and sift it into a large mixing bowl.

2) Make a well in the flour and crack the eggs into the well. Add the olive oil and salt. Beat the egg mixture with a fork and incorporate the beaten egg mixture into the flour with the fork until the eggs disappear and a crumbly mixture forms.

3) Clean the dough off of your fork and add this dough to the bowl.

4) Holding the bowl with one hand, reach into the bowl with your other hand and continue to mix the dough by hand. In small increments, add as much of the cold water as you need to incorporate all of the flour in the bowl into a rough dough that holds together.

5) Turn your dough onto a clean work surface. Wash your hands to remove any dough before kneading.

6) Lightly dust your work surface. Knead the dough for a full 10 minutes.

7) Lightly flour the dough and wrap it in plastic. Let the dough rest in a refrigerator for 1½ hours.

8) Unwrap the dough and lightly dust it with flour. With a rolling pin, roll the dough out to a 3/8-inch thickness. As best you can, square off the sides of the dough sheet to form a square. Cut the dough lengthwise into 1/2-inch to 3/4-inch wide strips.

9) Attach your cavatelli machine to a sturdy work surface. Feed the dough strips into the machine by cranking the machine’s handle. Perfectly formed cavatelli will magically fall out of the machine’s head onto your work surface. Lightly dust the cavatelli with flour to prevent them from sticking together and spread them out on a floured board. After feeding through all of the dough, you should have approximately 1 pound of cavatelli.

Cook the cavatelli in a large pot full of salty, boiling water. When you add the pasta, the boil may slow or disappear. Mix the pasta in the water to help prevent the pasta from sticking together. After the water has returned to a full boil for approximately 3 minutes, start testing the cavatelli. The pasta is ready when it loses its raw taste. It should be wonderfully chewy but not gummy. Drain the pasta into a colander and shake the colander to remove excess water. Add the cavatelli into your ready sauce and cook the two together for a minute or so.

Zanini De Vita writes that cavatelli is traditionally “served with meat or vegetable sauces, always made with chili and finished with a dusting of local cheese, usually cacioricotta.” Pictured is cavatelli served with a roasted cherry tomato sauce made with finely chopped basil, grated cheese and, of course, a pinch of chili pepper.