Egg-free Ravioli!

I've been thinking about making my own pasta for ages but never really looked into how to make it without eggs. I remember my mum used to make pasta when we were younger but then I think she got fed up of the mess created when using the pasta machine. Anyway, I did a quick search on google for "egg free pasta". Plenty of results came up so I picked two different sites; one used only durum wheat semolina flour and the other used 50:50 semolina and plain flour. The recipe I would choose depended largely on what the supermarket had in the way of flour. As it turns out the only option i the supermarket was "Pasta Flour" - a 50:50 mix. So I used the latter recipe but increased the quantities because more is better. Here's the ingredients:
- 1 1/2 cups of pasta flour (half durum wheat semolina, half normal wheat flour, I used Doves Farm Organic)
- 1 1/2 table spoons of olive oil (extra virgin)
- about 5 table spoons of water (I added as necessary)

Here's the method in pictures.

Start by making a well in the flour. Into this put the olive oil and a couple of table spoons of water. Then start mixing with a fork, gradually pulling flour into the liquid in the middle until a paste is formed. Then star mashing all the flour together with the fork and add water as necessary.

Please note that the peanut butter plays no part in this recipe.




As you can see I ended up with a mess. Jumping in with my hands and adding more water when needed allowed me to gradually build up a ball of dough that was slightly sticky to the touch.








Here is the ball of dough. As per the recipe I was following I decided to leave this to rest. I'm not sure why. I didn't read the recipe in enough detail to find out if it says. Anyway, after about an hour in a sealed up freezer bag, the dough felt much better in its consistency.


While the dough was resting I made a tomato sauce to go over the ravioli and the filling.

For the filling I defrosted some frozen finely chopped spinach (not shopped or frozen by me) in a pan with a tiny bit of olive oil to stop it sticking to the pan. Probably used 7 lumps of spinach. In went a bit of salt and pepper. Some of the spinach juice was drained off once it was all defrosted. Then I put in a whole 250g tub of ricotta. I could've used Quark but it's really not the same as the full fat stuff. Once mixed together I put this into a bowl as I needed the pan for the sauce.

The sauce consisted of heating some olive oil in a pan with oregano and plenty of salt and freshly ground black pepper. When the oil starts spitting (careful, it hurts) I put in some not-so-finely chopped garlic. After about 30 seconds (don't want the garlic to burn) I threw in a carton of passata. I used the supermarkets own cheap stuff. It soon thickens up and tastes like you used the expensive one.

After the dough had finished resting I rolled it out as thinly as I could. This takes a lot of effort and I imagine it's a lot easier with a pasta machine. Half way through rolling Rachel informed me she has a pasta machine that was her Grandad's. Great, I can use that one day when we live together (to be honest it'll probably only be me that uses it).




I rolled it out in 3 lots to make life easier.










I cut these into strips using a pizza cutter (Park Tools - an excellent bit of kit). I tried to make pairs of strips, with one slightly wider than the other (a top and bottom). I added some filling onto the bottom strips and pressed on the top.

I then pulled out the pizza cutter again to divide up the individual ravioli.

The ravioli were then thrown into a pot of boiling water (salted and oiled). Cooking time was probably around 2-4 minutes. Difficult to say. I checked their ready-ness by testing how squidgy but also stiff the corners were. This turned out to be a good indicator.

And here they are plated up. Bit of sauce smeared on the plate first to prevent sticking and then plenty of sauce on top. No need for cheese due to the quantity of ricotta used.

Verdict? Very tasty. I was surprised at how good the dough was and how well it cooked. I'll be making these again but with different fillings. I quite fancy some sort of squash and walnut filling...that'd be suitable for vegans, not just vegetarians.

So there you have it, egg-free ravioli.

Home-made bicycle grips

So I'm in the process of building up the Pompino frame, finally. I brought the wheels (which George very kindly built for me) back up with on Saturday and the headset is being fitted tomorrow. This means that my current "hack" bike can go back to its rightful owner...the frame was on loan from George so I will return it with some bits that I no longer need (and may also have been on loan). When I left Peacehaven on Saturday I assured George that I had all the necessary bits allowing me to swap components off of the Explosif (current stead) to make it ridabloe to bring back. I was mostly right. Only things I didn't have were brake levers (using the ones that'll go ont he Pomp but must remember to bring them back to York with me) and grips. I decided I could make the grips. Here they are...

In choosing how to make the grips and the materials required, I decided that the grips should be well cushioned and grippy. To make them well-cushioned I chose to use some packing foam, usually found around new bike parts. I cut these to about the right length.



They were then attached to the handlebars using some electrical tape, as shown...
This was later modified to include tape that held the foam to the bar internally to prevent it from twisting on the bar (turns out that didn't work very well and they do twist).



This foam was then tightly wrapped in a strip of old innertube. This innertube was held firmly in place with more electrical tape and a couple of cable ties for added security.

How do they feel? Not bad. Rode 27 miles using them the day they were constructed and my hands and wrists didn't ache at the end of the ride. They do now twist round (2 days later) which is slightly annoying but I can live with it until the end of the week.

Riding and foraging

Went for a cracking ride on Sunday. The weather was fantastic so Charlie, Jonny and I went for a little 27 mile tour of the some of the (South) Eastern villages of York. Here's a map of the route. You might need to zoom in on the map. You might even need to find the UK first.

I didn't actually take any pictures during the ride. Should've really. Anyway, when I got home I decided to take a picture of the fruit and veg that was foraged/pilfered by us whilst riding. Not a bad haul. The broad beans came from a field. Jonny jumped in and filled his pockets with them. His justification being that crops are never harvested right up to the edge of a field. Sounds good to me. The cherries came from a tree on the York/Selby bike route. It's a public path so those cherries are fair game right? We're going back soon to get some more. Might even make some sort of cherry jam.

Trying to use the blog more...

It's been a couple of years since I started this blog. Haven't posted a single thing. Oops.

In an attempt to make up for it I'll be posting 3 lots of photos.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog! (this is as much a welcome to me as it is to anyone reading this, not having blogged since I was a young 'un)

This is my blog where I'm going to hopefully share my photos and thoughts surrounding them. I'm an amateur so don't expect masterpieces! I'm hoping that blogging this way will help me remember how I took particular shots, why I took them and (later) I'll be able to see how to improve them.

I will not be talking about my life (unless relevant at the time) and going on about who's talking about who, which of my friends slept with someone, my girlfriend, etc. mainly because you (the reader) could be a complete stranger and probably have no interest in all that stuff. And anything I say about all that stuff could get me into trouble ;-)

So enjoy the photos when they start appearing and please give me your thoughts on them.

Cheers.