Homemade Ravioli Press(es)

Last spring I got into making ravioli. After the the first session of cutting them out by hand a ravioli press sounded really really good.

We went to the cooking store to scope one out. It seemed a little pricey at $25 so I thought I’d try to make one.

Molly (My wife) : Admit it, you wanted to make one from the beginning. I know how your mind works!

Me: Come on, $25 for a little piece of aluminum. It was screaming for me to reproduce it.

We took a bunch of photos of the press to use as a model.

Draw It Up

I printed out the pictures from the cooking store to use as a base for my design. Ok....maybe I completely copied it. It took me forever to get the zig zag intersections to work. After that I output it as gcode and ran it on my homemade CNC router. The router cut and cut and delivered up a beautiful ravioli press.

Testing......

Now that I had a press it was time to test it out. It worked really well.

Testing....

Kinda went nuts with the ravioli....

After the massive ravioli session It was clear that I hadn't made the tops of the zig-zags sharp enough. We had to go back and cut each ravioli apart by hand. Also, the size of the ravioli was slightly smaller than the typical ravioli. Even though the wooden press worked fine I wanted to try making a metal one.

Back to the Drawing Board

I re-drew the ravioli press and made a test prototype out of foam.

Playing With Molten Metal

I dipped the foam in plaster, packed it in sand and cast it in aluminum.

Wish you had a metal casting furnace? You can build your own. Do it! I show you how here and here.

Fail!

This is supposed to be the part where I tell you how the metal press was a great improvement over the wood one. Well...didn't quite work out like that. The metal froze before it filed the entire mold. I didn't go any further with it. I really like how the zig zags look though.

A couple months later I found a ravioli press on sale so…I ended up buying it.

I know that I can go a little overboard trying to make (most) things. Like this one, not all projects are a success. I like the challenge regardless and I always learn something along the way that ultimately will apply to future projects.

Molly: Yum! lobster ravioli!

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Thanks!!