deVine Table

Milk Tranforming into Ricotta

Now that I am enrolled in a cheese and wine pairing class at Northwest Wine Academy, I feel inspired to give home cheesemaking a try. Recently, I saw a recipe for Rosemary Garlic Ricotta Cheese  come across the Twittersphere via TableFare that looks fairly easy. Turns out, it really is!

The hardest part is trying to figure out if  the curd development is progressing as it should. When it took over 45 minutes for the milk to get up to temperature, slight panic set in as I wondered if I really would have time to prepare everything else for dinner. Or would this experiment require constant supervision for hours? Turns out I could have turned the heat up a little higher. In any case, the cheese turned out fine. Better than fine, actually! Way better than anything I’ve ever purchased at the supermarket.

Ricotta Draining

So, what to do with that cheese? Combine it with fresh basil, mozzarella, and rigatoni pasta, top it with smoked tomato sauce, then bake it. Easy and delicious! You can even assemble this dish up to one day ahead of time. Just keep it tightly covered in plastic in the fridge, and add about 5 minutes of baking time. This recipe is adapted from the cookbook, Pasta Recipes and Techniques by Julia Della Croce.

Makes 6 servings.

• 1 batch homemade ricotta cheese
• 1/2 pound water packed mozzarella
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh basil
• 1 pound fresh rigatoni pasta
• 1 jar Cucina Fresca Smoked Tomato Sauce
• 1/4 cup freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano

While the oven preheats to 375°, prep the ingredients. In a medium mixing bowl, combine the ricotta, mozzarella, eggs, and basil.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Then, add the pasta, and cook until almost al dente. It will still be a little firm and will soften up more during baking. When I prepared this recipe, the pasta only needed a little over one minute in the boiling water. When it is ready, drain it, then add it to the bowl with the herbed cheese mixture, and combine.

Baked Rigatoni

Assemble the ingredients in a small oven proof casserole or baking dish, such as an 8″ x 8″ Pyrex dish. Begin by drizzling half of the tomato sauce on the bottom of the dish. Add the cheese and pasta to the baking dish, and spread it out so that you have an even layer. Top with the remaining sauce and the Parmigiano Reggiano.

Bake for 20 minutes until the cheese on top is slightly browned. Serve and enjoy!

Wine Pairing

We enjoyed this dish with a Salice Salentino. For dinner party inspiration, see the full Viva Italia menu.

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Tags: Recipe, Ricotta cheese, Salice salentino, Vegetarian

This entry was posted on Monday, April 26th, 2010 at 9:44 pm and is filed under Entrees, Red Wine, Vegetarian. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.