e6. 21
A CRAB RAVIOLI MEAL with SAUCES, SALAD and BISCUITS
Made with Gluten Lactose-Free products
Makes 45 ravioli
In this post I am giving you the recipes I used to make the whole meal.
This is a meal I planned for our 45th anniversary back in February. But with the covid vaccinations, and hospitalizations and recovery etc. that just didn’t happen. Finally, after all this time I am able to think of taking on the ‘project’ of a meal requiring several steps.
Yes, it is a project, but I decided to make the components over the course of several days, ending with baking the refrigerated biscuits, cooking the refrigerated ravioli, getting the salad together and making the sauces as my guests were on the way!
I have checked in stores as well as online to see if I could find gluten and lactose free raviolis and my research got me a resounding no!
So, the only way to have this delicious meal was to make it myself and invited our daughter and her husband to join us for this deliciousness!
I made this meal over several days. I wanted to enjoy the meal rather than end up with a monumental chore.
Here were my stages:
Make GLUTEN FREE PASTA DOUGH and leave to rest in refrigerator
Make CRAB or SALMON FILLINGS divide into 1 T portions and refrigerate
Assemble THE RAVIOLI and refrigerate
Make LEMON VINEGRETT for the SALAD and refrigerate
Bake GLUTEN FREE QUICK DROP BISCUITS on the day of serving
Get the SALAD together
Cook THE RAVIOLI on the day of serving
Make CITRUS and or the LIGHT TOMATO SAUCE on the day of serving
The crab filled ravioli, the sauces, the salad with the lemon vinaigrette and the drop biscuits all went together well. Keeping with the citrus theme I served Lime Outshine bars for dessert.
I made salmon filled ravioli (got 24 out of 1 14 oz can) using the left-over pasta dough with the coconut sauce a few days later and served with a salad and it was also a very yummy meal.
Enjoy!
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GLUTEN-FREE PASTA DOUGH
Made with gluten free products.
(You can use gluten-free wonton wraps if you can find them.)
I had 1 T size portions fillings from one 16 ounce can of crab, so I made 2 batches of dough. Don’t double the recipe, make it twice.
After many experiments I decided that using flour, kosher salt, xanthan gum, gua gum, whole eggs and water made the best dough for me.
I also discovered a mixture of xanthan gum and gua gum while not necessary, made the dough easy to roll out and this resulting held well in boiling water.
I decided to make the dough in the Cuisinart rather than in the stand mixer. Really kneading by hand when I have a Cuisinart, a stand mixer and a hand-held electric mixer with dough hooks did not seem sensible at all!
Finally, I feel confident in posting this recipe which was make with King Arthur’s All Purpose Gluten Free Flour.
Since we are both gluten and lactose intolerant and I am on a low-fat diet, the only way for us to have ravioli is to make them at home! Make the filling with meat, poultry, seafood or cheeses; go for it, you are the master of your ravioli. The best thing is you can make as many raviolis as you want, fill them with what you want and make them any size you want!
Peter and I both love pasta, but nothing beats homemade! Since coming home from the hospital, I have not had the energy to even try. This weekend Peter’s nephew Shai is getting married to a lovely lady called Diana, with most of the guests joining in on the wedding via Zoom. Catharine our daughter and her husband Willy are going to join us for lunch and the wedding. The idea is I am to make a crab ravioli meal and a salad for us for lunch.
I made two and a half batches of dough knowing I would have a lot of filling. I wanted lot of ravioli, so we could have as many raviolis as we wanted rather than the usual 6 you get in a restaurant! I ended up with extra dough which I made into ravioli with salmon filling, fettuccini and I saved all the scraps of dough to add to soups.
Gluten Free Fresh Pasta:
Prep:
King Arthur’s all-purpose flour – 284 g
Xanthan gum – 2 t
Gua gum – 1 t
Kosher salt – ½ t
Eggs – 4 whole at room temperature
Water - 1 or 2 T depending on the size of eggs you use. If more water is needed, add by the teaspoonful.
(I think the addition of ½ t baking soda and 1 t apple cider vinegar might make the dough more pliable. I will let you know the next time I make pasta.)
Let’s make pasta:
Whir the dry stuff to mix in the Cuisinart.
Add eggs and pulse to mix, the large Eggland's best eggs I used to made a dough that looked like coarse corn meal.
I needed to add 2 T of water, if needed add more by teaspoonfuls and whir till the dough forms into a pliable ball which is soft and smooth.
Remove from the processor and form into a rectangle that is about 1” or less thick and wrap in plastic wrap or place in a sandwich bag and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or overnight or is best.
(Mine ended up being refrigerated for 48 hours, and the extra dough for further 36 hours. I keep my refrigerator very cold and stored the dough in the coldest area.)
6.21
CRAB FILLING
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
Makes filling for 45 raviolis (1 T per ravioli) we had 18 left after four of us stuffed ourselves!
This crab filling for ravioli was just scrumptious. It is easy to make (if you prefer, make the filling by subbing canned salmon or small peeled shrimp or a mixture).
Prep the ingredients:
Red bell pepper – ½ c minced (option use just one color, squeeze as much liquid off the minced peppers prior to cooking)
Yellow bell pepper – ½ c minced
Green bell pepper – ½ c minced
Onion – ½ c minced – optionally use all scallion or all onion, you could use shallots
Scallion – ½ c minced
Garlic – 2 T minced
Ghee - 1 T (3 T total if needed)
Crabmeat - 16 oz can, drained, flaked, cartilage removed and minced
Lemon zest – 2 T
Lemon juice - 2 T
Old bay seasoning – 2 T
Garnish:
Black pepper – ½ t coarsely ground
Parsley – 2 T chopped
Let’s make the filling:
In a medium skillet, cook the onion, in ghee over medium heat with the old bay seasoning for about 4 minutes or until tender, beginning to turn golden and drying out, stirring occasionally.
Add 1 T of oil garlic and bell peppers and cook for 1 minute stirring till the fragrance of the garlic is released.
Remove from the heat and stir in crabmeat, lemon peel, lemon juice and zest.
At this point, I like to refrigerate or freeze the filling in 1 T portions. This makes the assembling of the ravioli really fast and not messy.
Follow directions for ‘assembling and cooking the ravioli’.
I served the raviolis with the citrus sauce and a light tomato sauce, an arugula and spinach salad with a lemon vinaigrette and gluten free drop biscuits.
6.21
SALMON FILLING with ROASTED GARLIC COCONUT SAUCE
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
Makes about 20 1 T fillings
With the salmon filling, the citrus sauce, light tomato sauce or the coconut sauce will all work.
Filling:
Salmon – ½ a 14 oz can skinned, deboned and drained
Olive oil – 1 to 2 T
Onion – 1 c finely chopped
Carrot – ¼ c finely chopped
Celery – ¼ c finely chopped
Red bell pepper – ¼ c finely chopped, squeezed dry
Kosher salt – 1 t
ground white pepper - 1/8 t
Dill – fresh 2 T chopped or 1 t dried
Potato – ¾ c mashed
Heat a 12” skillet on medium for 5 minutes, add 1 t oil and the onions and stir. Let cook for 5 minutes stirring till golden.
Add the rest of the oil and carrots and stir cook for 1 minute, add the celery and stir and cook for 1 minute, add the bell pepper stir and cook until the vegetables are softened.
Add the salmon, season with salt and pepper and stir and cook flaking the salmon as you stir until the salmon begins to turn golden. Remove from the fire and let cool.
When the salmon mixture is cooled, add the mashed potato and the dill and mix till well combined.
Portion out the salmon in 1 T size mounds and refrigerate until ready to fill ravioli. Follow directions for ‘assembling and cooking the ravioli’.
Sauce:
Makes 1 c sauce
Olive oil – 2 t
Gluten free starch – 1 T, corn or tapioca or other starch
coconut milk – 1 c
Kosher salt – ½ t
Ground white pepper – ¼ t
ground nutmeg - ¼ t
garlic - 1 large head
Garnish:
Dill - 1 T rough chopped
Let’s cook the filling:
Remove the papery skin from a head of garlic. Cut ½" from the stem end to expose cloves. Place cut side up on a piece of aluminum foil and drizzle with oil, wrap tightly and bake at 350F for 45 minutes and set aside to cool in the wrapping. Squeeze the cooled garlic out and mash with fork.
(While I roast the garlic, I roast vegetables, tossed in oil, salt and pepper, instead of wasting the oven heat, to use later.)
Heat a large skillet on medium heat for 5 minutes and add oil. Whisk the starch and coconut milk with salt, pepper, the mashed garlic together and add to the skillet and cook stirring until the sauce thickens, remove from heat and add the nutmeg.
Pour 2/3 of the sauce into a bowl to serve on the side. Use the rest of the sauce to toss with the raviolis so they don’t stick together.
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ASSEMBLING AND COOKING THE RAVIOLI
Roll out the dough and form the ravioli:
Dust a large rimmed baking sheet with fine ground cornmeal and set aside.
I like to use cornstarch on the rollers and counter when I am rolling out the dough, then place on the sheet pan covered in cornmeal and dust corn meal on top of the sheets and cover with a kitchen cloth to keep the pasta from drying out.
Let’s make the pasta sheets:
Set the pasta maker to the largest opening; dust lightly with cornstarch. Divide the dough into 4 pieces and flatten each into a narrow rectangle about ½" thick (no thicker than mouth of the machine); pass through the rollers.
Fold, flatten with a rolling pin, then the machine. Do this as needed and roll again about 6 times until the pasta sheet is smooth and has straight sides, (don’t worry about the ends, you can trim to make them straight) sprinkle with cornstarch as needed and brush off any extra. (Dough that not being used should be kept refrigerated until ready to use.)
Adjusting the rollers to decreasingly thinner settings repeat this process running the sheet through each decreasing setting once, until you reach setting #5 on the Imperia machine (the last setting is #6 and I find it too thin to work with gluten free dough) If you don't have a machine, you can roll out sheets lengthwise with a rolling pin until little less than 1/8" thick. If you can see your hand when held behind the sheet of pasta, you have rolled the GLUTEN-FREE pasta too thin for ravioli. Roll out as many sheets of dough as you need.
Form the ravioli: *
After your dough is thin enough, cut each sheet of dough in two manageable sections. Starting ¾ " from the short edge, using the already formed and frozen filling portions down length, spacing about 1 1/2" apart.
Brush the dough and the top of your filling with egg wash (1 egg beaten with 1 T water) and cover them with the second piece of dough you cut off in the previous step. The egg wash helps the dough stay in place, bonding the two layers. Save the scraps, spray a little water and refrigerate wrapped in plastic or in a sandwich bag until all the ravioli is made.
Or you can place the filling ½” from one of the long edges, still ¾” from the short edge, brush the egg wash on the edge and in between and over the filling then, fold the other rest of the pasta sheet over the filling so the edges of the pasta sheets meet.
Either way, use your fingers press outward from the mounds of filling toward the edges, pushing out air pockets, sealing the dough around each mound of filling. THIS STEP OF GETTING RID OF AIR POCKETS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP IN ASSEMBLING RAVIOLI. Else the raviolis might burst in the water spilling out the filling or cook unevenly.
Separating the ravioli:
Using the cutter of choice, (knife, ravioli cutter, biscuit cutter or pizza cutter), separate the ravioli. Arrange them on the prepared sheet pan and dust with cornmeal. Cover the ravioli with and refrigerate or freeze depending on your plans. (I like to place the sheet pan in a large produce bag the kind meant for greens or you can use plastic wrap) Repeat until all the dough and filling is used up.
Cooking the ravioli:
Cook in batches without overcrowding.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
Add the ravioli to the pot. They will sink to the bottom. In a few minutes the ravioli will float to the top. Cook for 4 to 6 minutes until the ravioli is cooked to your taste, remove with a slotted spoon or skimmer and toss with sauce or a little oil whisked with some of the cooking water to keep the ravioli from sticking together.
6.21
CRAB RAVIOLI SAUCE OPTIONS
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
Light sauces made with lemons or tomatoes went exceptionally well with these raviolis.
After I made the citrus sauce, I felt it was a little flat, but the addition of a couple of Tablespoons of Zesty Italian Dressing fixed it.
You could also use browned ghee as a sauce and lemon zest as a garnish. Yumm!
If you plan to make a light tomato sauce as well as the citrus sauce, toss the raviolis in some olive oil whisked with some of the cooking water to keep them from sticking together.
THE CITRUS SAUCE
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
About 2 ½ cups
Prep
Ghee – 2 T
Chicken stock – 1 ½ c
Corn starch – 1 T
White wine – 2 T or white wine vinegar
Lemon juice – 6 T or a mixture of lemon, lime or orange
Agave – 2 T, or sweetener of your choice, add little at a time and check the taste
Lemon zest – 2 to 3 T or a mixture of lemon, lime or
Zesty Italian Dressing – 2 to 3 T if necessary
Let's make a citrus sauce
Whisk everything except the zest in a bowl or a small saucepan over medium low heat stirring until thickened. Remove from heat and stir in some ½ the zest, keep the rest aside to use as a garnish.
Pour 2/3 of the sauce into a bowl to serve at the table, use the rest of the sauce to toss with the ravioli so they don’t stick.
LIGHT TOMATO SAUCE
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
About 2 ½ cups
This is a super easy sauce to make.
Basic tomato sauce – 1 ½ cups (use from a jar or make your own, the recipe is in the blog)
Chicken broth – 1 c
Let's make a light tomato sauce
Heat chicken broth and tomato sauce together and you are done!
Pour about 2/3 into a bowl to serve at table. The remaining 1/3, use to toss with the ravioli to keep them from sticking together.
6.21
LEMON VINAIGRETTE
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free Products
Makes 1/2 c, if you double the recipe, you will have enough dressing for several days.
This easy to make lovely, delicious and versatile lemon vinaigrette is great for tossing with salads, roasted vegetables or as a dip for raw vegetables. This is a favorite in our house!
I used a mixed package of baby arugula and baby spinach dressed with this vinaigrette.
Prep:
lemon juice - 1/4 c
Garlic - 1 t grated
Dijon mustard - 1 t
Kosher salt – ¼ t or more to taste
Black pepper – 1/8 t freshly ground
honey or maple syrup – ½ t, optional
Extra virgin olive oil – ¼ e ½ c
Fresh or dried herbs – ½ to 1 t, thyme, parsley, rosemary depending on the accompanying meal optional
Let’s make the dressing:
In a 1 c measurer, whisk together the lemon juice, garlic, mustard, salt, pepper, and honey, if using.
Slowly dribble the olive oil while whisking and continue to whisk until the dressing is emulsified.
Or, combine everything in a jar with a tight-fitting lid and shake or use an immersion blender.
Adjust the seasoning by adding more olive oil, salt, pepper or the herbs to taste.
Store in the fridge for more than a week. The olive oil will solidify in the refrigerator. Leave out on the counter a few minutes and shake before using.
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EASY GLUTEN-FREE DROP BISCUITS
Preheat oven to 425F.
Made with Gluten and Lactose-Free products
I found this recipe in Nichole Hunn's blog and riffed it.
I made this with Earth Balance vegan buttery sticks to make it lactose-free. I used Soco buttermilk powder make the buttermilk. If you can't use Soco, make your own buttermilk by adding lemon juice to your Lactaid Milk or unflavored nondairy milk.
These wonderfully tender and light gluten free drop biscuits are ready in about 30 minutes. They are tasty, fast and easy.
Make shape and freeze the biscuits and put them into a preheated oven for 12 to 15 minutes. If frozen uncooked, give a little extra time in the oven to thaw.
Prep the ingredients:
Dry stuff:
Better Batter – 245 g, I use Nicole Hunn's ‘mock’ Better Batter*
Starch – ¼ c, corn, potato or arrowroot starch
Baking powder – 1 T, rounded
Baking soda – ¼ t
Kosher salt - ½ t
Sugar – 2 t (8 g)
Xanthan gum – 1 t
Wet stuff:
Vegan butter or Ghee - 8 T (112 g) unsalted, cut into a 1/4-inch dice or grated and chilled
Buttermilk - 1 cup (8 g), chilled
Fresh herbs – 2 T, finely chopped
Topping:
Melted vegan butter or ghee - 1 T (14 g)
Prep:
Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
Whisk the dry stuff in a large bowl.
Add the diced or grated and chilled vegan butter, and toss to mix.
Create a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the buttermilk and mix until just combined.
Working quickly so the dough doesn’t get warm, drop the batter by the quarter cup, using two large spoons or a 2” ice cream scoop about 1 ½" apart on the prepared baking sheet.
Flatten the tops by pressing the mounds of dough down gently and brush the melted fat on top with a brush.
Place the baking sheet in the center of the preheated oven and bake until lightly golden brown (about 15 minutes). Remove from the oven and allow to cool a little before serving.
*The following recipe makes 140g of ‘mock better batter’. It is the all-purpose flour I use in most of my recipes, make as much as you need. I generally make 10 cups at a time and store in an air tight container to use as needed.
Superfine brown rice flour – 42 g (Authentic Brands)
Superfine white rice flour – 42 g (Authentic Brands)
Tapioca starch - 21 g
potato starch - 21 g
potato flour - 7 g
xanthan gum - 4 g
pure powdered pectin – 3 g (Pomona brand)
Enjoy!