Italy is famous for its delicious food and we, Italian people, know it really well. In Bologna, where I have born and I still live, we are famous for a lot of things: Bolognese sauce for sure, Lasagna, Tortellini etc but pay attention: Bolognese Spaghetti doesn't exist in Italy... I am sorry to reveal that, but we don't eat Spaghetti with bolognese sauce, we eat tagliatelle or other shapes of pasta, but not spaghetti. We eat Spaghetti with other sauce such as tomato sauce or carbonara!
Now that this is clear I would like to tell you something more about this sweet called "Raviole". This sweet is traditionally prepared in Bologna for St Giuseppe day, on 19 March, and here is Father's day. Sometimes you can decorate them writing something sweet on it as "Happy Father's day" or "I love you, Dad" - here in photo "Auguri papà" = "Auguri" can be translated with "Best wishes" and "papà" is "father/dad"... I bought it from a bakery some years ago and my dad was really happy :D
Nowadays you can find them in a bakery or supermarket almost every day of the year since it is perfect for breakfast, for snacks or also end a lunch/dinner.
Raviole is a short pastry filled with jam. Jam originally is "mostarda", a typical jam prepared with different kinds of fruits: usually you can find apple, pear, oranges, and plums, but the exact recipe can change depending on the season and which fruit is available and on the family tradition. Now you can fill raviole with what you like most: apricot jam, plum jam or in general every kind of jam and for children you can also put Nutella!
The recipe as I told you changes for every family, we have one that is secret - my mum is really jealous about her bake recipe! The only thing that I can tell you is we put flour, sugar, eggs, butter, milk, lemon, yeast, and obviously jam!
Fun personal fact
As I told you this is a traditional sweet from Bologna and last year I was in the UK and I was homesick so I decided to try to do raviole. The point is that I didn't find the yeast - in the UK it is not so common and they use a lot of baking soda in cake/biscuit that is different from yeast obviously. So, as I am really brave, I tried to bake without yeast and instead I put baking soda.... the result was not so good, I can also say terrible because I don't even take a photo lol! So, my final suggestion is put always yeast in your cake or at least try to find a full English recipe with all the right ingredients
Have you ever eaten this or something similar? Would you like to try?
I've never tried Raviole, but I will love to try it someday. Maybe, I dare to make them, of course, with yeast. :)