Hedgehog shaped ravioli with a potato, olive and rosemary filling

This week is Hedgehog Awareness Week and I can't keep saying it enough. Yesterday I already wrote an Old Prickly post, but now I am going to continue with the all important hedgehog theme. I made suitable hedgehog shaped ravioli with a potato, olive and rosemary filling. I have made hedgehog ravioli before, but the potato filling was a first for me. All the components tasted in the mix, so it worked really well and I liked this ravioli version a lot.

As the May theme for The Vegetable Palette challenge is “your favourite vegetable”, I thought I'd share this recipe there as well. The Vegetable Palette is a monthly vegetarian food blogging challenge hosted by Shaheen from A2K - A Seasonal Veg Table. I though long and hard what would be my favourite vegetable, as it constantly changes and there are many, but potatoes are pretty much always up there on the top of my list. They are so versatile, subtle yet tasty and also easy to cook in many shapes and forms. So there you have it, I love potatoes! In this recipe I of course combined them in a way I have never done before, which was also a great experience. 

 

I will also share this recipe with another food blogging challenge, Pasta Please, which is hosted this month by Jen from Jen's Food and created by Jacqueline from Tinned Tomatoes. The theme in May is free, as long as the recipe contains some pasta. 

Here is my recipe for these small prickly beasts and it does make quite an array of them:

Pasta:

400 g grade 00 pasta flour

4 eggs

1 tsp salt

Filling:

500 g potatoes

200 g green olives

Sprinkle of salt

Fresh rosemary leaves

25 g grated mature cheddar

Method

Make the pasta first by kneading the pasta flour, eggs and salt into a firm dough. Let it rest wrapped in a cling film in the fridge for at least one hour.

Boil the peeled potatoes until they are done and mash them. Let the mash cool. Grind the olives into a smooth paste with a mortar and pestle and add them to the mash. Also add the salt, rosemary and little grated cheddar.

Start working the pasta dough thinner and thinner by rolling it through a pasta machine. Once you are happy with the texture and thinness, cut some hedgehog shapes from the dough. Put a little teaspoonful of the potato filling onto a hedgehog shape, brush the edges with water and press it closed with another hedgehog.

Cook the hedgehog ravioli until they are al dente and serve. I served them simply on a bed of salad drizzled with olive oil. Enjoy!

Your VegHog