Egg free ricotta dumplings with herbs pesto sauce and mozzarella

Recipe proposed by Elena Blog Conunpocodizucchero.it

These dumplings are soft and light, easy and very fast to prepare.

Ingredients

For the egg free ricotta dumplings:

- 250g fresh cow’s milk ricotta well drained

- 80-110g flour + a little bit for the pastry board

- salt

- pepper

- nutmeg

For the aromatic herb pesto sauce:

- 80g mixed aromatic herbs (I used basil, parsley and chives)

- 35g shelled walnuts

- 25g parmesan cheese

- 20g roman pecorino

- extra virgin olive oil

- pesteda Vis

To complete:

- mozzarella fior di latte

- pesteda Vis

Preparation

Prepare the eggs free ricotta dumplings: pour the well-drained ricotta into a bowl, add 2 pinches of salt, a pinch of pepper and plenty of grated nutmeg. Soften it with a spoon and add the flour: put at first 80 g and mix it with the cheese to get a fairly firm dough. Add the rest of the flour if necessary in order to get the right consistency of your dough.

Put the dough on the floured pastry board and divide it into 4 parts. Shape each in small loaf, flour and cut into pieces. Form a small ball with each piece: you have your ricotta dumplings ready to cook!

Boil plenty of water to cook your dumplings, add salt and dip few dumplings at a time: cook them until they rise up, drain them and place them gradually in a baking tin seasoning with a drop of oil.

Prepare the aromatic herbs pesto sauce: wash and dry all the herbs, place them in the blender jug, add the chopped walnuts, grated parmesan and pecorino cheese and two pinches of pesteda. Blend adding gradually the oil in order to get a soft consistency.

Cut out 6 thick slices from mozzarella and cut them into cubes.

Season the dumplings with some pesto sauce softened with a little cooking water and complete with mozzarella and some more pesteda: melt the cheese by passing the tin for 2 minutes in the microwave at maximum power, or for 8-10 minutes at 220 ° C in the traditional oven.

Serve immdiately!

Notes:

Keep the pesto sauce in the fridge, in a glass jar or in a tupperware, covered with a little oil and eat it within 2 days.
You can also prepare a pesto with other aromatic herbs in the same way or replace the walnuts with the pine nuts.
You can freeze both the aromatic herbs pesto sauce and the dumplings: freeze them raw, taking care to place them spaced on a tray or a plate and, only once frozen, you can put them together in a freezer bag. In this way the dumpings will freeze one by one and you won’t risk sticking to each other during cooking. For cooking them: put them frozen in boiling salted water.