Well folks, I think Dave might divorce me if I make one more Buffalo Chicken dish. But this last one (for a while) is beyond anything in my wildest dreams.
In college, there were two nights that were my favorite: Fridays and Toasted Ravioli night in Ray Cafe. The line would snake out the door and down the stairs, even in the dead of winter. Cheesy goodness sandwiched between two plump sheets of pasta, breaded and fried to perfection.
The irony of this particular recipe is that I was actually gonna round up this BC series with a skinny version of the Buffalo Chicken Eggrolls that I made a while back, as I knew I had some egg roll wrappers left in the freezer. When I went to take the egg roll wrappers out of the freezer though, I discovered that they were in fact won ton wrappers. Shoot.
Wait. Won ton wrappers. hmmmmmm.
The wheels turned.
“What can I do with won tons wrappers”?
BUFFALO CHICKEN RAVIOLI! That’s it!
Oh and I’ll fry them – what the hell.
When I say these are beyond amazing, they are b-e-y-o-n-d amazing. If you don’t need them all right now, fry half and freeze the rest for another time. Or make them all at once, and try not to finish all 3 dozen – I triple dog dare ya.
Toasted Buffalo Chicken Ravioli
INGREDIENTS
*yields just about 3 dozen ravioli
1 -15oz container part skim ricotta cheese
1 egg, lightly beaten + 3-4 more eggs, lightly beaten for lining won ton edges & dipping the raviolis
1 cup crumbled blue cheese
1 cup cooked chicken
2 stalks of celery, chopped small
2 small garlic cloves, minced
1 bunch of scallions, minced
salt & pepper to taste
1/2 cup Frank’s hot sauce
72 won ton wrappers
vegetable oil for frying
3-4 cups bread crumbs
*ranch or blue cheese dressing for dipping/drizzling and sliced green onions for garnish
1) In a small mixing bowl, combine the egg and ricotta cheese together until mixed. Then fold in the blue cheese crumbles and set aside.
2) In a medium saucepan, saute your cooked chicken, celery, garlic and scallions for about 3 minutes. Season lightly with salt and pepper. After 3 minutes, add in the Frank’s hot sauce and stir for another 1-2 minutes.
3) Add the hot chicken/veggie mixture to the ricotta/blue cheese and stir until combined.
4) Line 3 baking sheets with wax paper. Lay out 12 won ton wrappers on each sheet. Baste the edges of each won ton wrapper with egg wash, and then place 1 tablespoon of the buffalo chicken/ricotta mixture in the center of the won ton wrapper.
5) Cover each won ton with the other 36 wrappers, and seal each ravioli together with a fork, similar to how you would if you were sealing the edges of a pie together. These won ton wrappers make a sizeable ravioli, so feel free to trim them if you don’t want as much edging.
6) Let raviolis chill in the refrigerator for about 20 – 30 minutes. This will help them to stay together when you’re frying.
7) When your raviolis are ready, take medium-large, heavy bottomed skillet and fill it about 1/3 way with vegetable oil. Heat your vegetable oil over medium heat for 3-5 minutes until you start to see little ripples form, or when you flick it with water it makes a ‘sssssssssssssssssss’ noise (very technical I know – I don’t have a heat thermometer, so I make up my own methods!)
8) Take 2 shallow mixing bowls: in one, place the other 3-4 lightly beaten eggs and in the other, the breadcrumbs. Take 3-4 raviolis at a time, dipping them first in the egg and then the breadcrumbs, and then place them in the hot oil You don’t want to crowd them, so I’d advise only doing about 4 or 5 at a time, depending on how large your skillet is.
9) Let cook on one side for about a minute and a half, and then flip over and cook on the other side for another minute and a half. You can judge this time by how golden brown you want your raviolis, but 90 minutes on each side gave them a really nice golden brown color and a great crispy crunch.
*I highly recommend heating the oil in batches as well. You’ll find that the breadcrumbs will start to fall into the oil and burn, and if you use the same oil for all 36 raviolis, well they might get some burnt crumbs on the outside of them. So try refilling/heating your 2-3 times to avoid that burnt taste.
10) Once all your raviolis have been fried, you can drizzle them with ranch or blue cheese dressing and garnish with sliced green onions.
OR you could do what I did.
Skipped the dipping and garnishing – ate three of them right out of the oil and burnt the top layer of skin off of the roof of my mouth.
It was totally worth it 🙂
Many apologies for the um – strange angle on this potpie photo.
My plan was to cut a little sliver, then take a picture. But after tasting that little sliver, and then Dave tasting a little sliver, I cut and ate another sliver because the oozy goodness was like a bad drug that I couldn’t get enough of.
And before I knew it, half the pie was gone – oops.
Well I tried my best, and this was just far too delicious not to share with all of you! Adapted from my girl Ina, cuz’ she knows that it doesn’t really matter what the pie looks like, but more so what it tastes like. And it tasted gooooooooooood.
Buffalo Chicken Pot Pie
*Adapted from Ina Garten
INGREDIENTS
*yields 1 – 9″ Chicken Pot Pie
For the Crust
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 and 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1/4 pound cold unsalted butter, diced
1/2 to 2/3 cup ice water
1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water, for egg wash
For the filling:
4 cups chicken stock
(obviously Ina wants you to use homemade – I however did not)
12 tablespoons (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter
2 small onions chopped
2 small garlic cloves, minced
1 large carrot, chopped
2 stalks of celery, chopped
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup crumbled blue cheese
1 cup Frank’s Hot Sauce
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup heavy cream
4-6 cups cooked chicken, shredded or cut into cubes
(In a pinch, the pre-cooked Rotissere chickens that you can get at the grocery store are a great option to save some time)
To prepare your crust:
1) Mix the flour, salt, and baking powder in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Add the shortening and butter and mix quickly with your fingers until each piece is coated with flour.
2) Pulse 10 times, or until the fat is the size of peas, then with the motor running, add the ice water; process only enough to moisten the dough and have it just come together. 1/2 cup was plenty.
3) Dump the dough out onto a floured board and knead quickly into a ball. Wrap the dough in plastic and allow it to rest in the refrigerator for 30 minutes. In the meantime, you can prepare your filling.
To prepare your filling:
1) In a small saucepan, heat the chicken stock.
2) In a large pot or Dutch oven, melt the butter and saute the onions, garlic, celery and carrots over medium-low heat for 10 to 15 minutes, until translucent.
3) Add the flour and blue cheese to the veggie mixture and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes. Add the hot chicken stock and hot sauce and simmer over low heat stirring, until the mixture starts to thicken. Season with salt and pepper and then add the heavy cream and cubed chicken and mix well.
4) Reduce heat to low and let the mixture simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until it becomes a thicker, gravy like texture.
5) Take your crust from the refrigerator and split it into two halves. Roll each half out to about 10″ in diameter.
6) Grease your 9″ pie plate with butter or non-stick cooking spray. If you’re using a cast iron skillet like we did, no need to grease the pan beforehand. Place one half of the dough on the bottom, letting the edges hang over, add your filling, and then cover the filling with the other half of the rolled out dough. Cut off any excess dough, leaving just enough to pinch the edges together to seal the pie.
7) Brush the top of your pie with the egg wash.
8) Bake in preheated oven for 1 hour, or until the top of the crust becomes golden brown. Let sit for about 10 minutes before cutting and serving.
And They Cooked Happily Ever After 