Rev: Easy Ravioli Bake (March, 2004)

[Ralph]

I'm actually disappointed to be posting a thumbs down review. I made it last night & just plain didn't care for this. I thought it might improve to eat as leftovers - NOPE!

I found the sauce to be extremely sweet, even though no sugar was added. I'm assuming it's just a combination of the tomatoes, tomato paste, & the wine.

And a word of warning: It will NOT fit in an 8-inch square pan; not even an 11x7 pan. I had to use my 9x13 baking dish. I kept re-reading the recipe thinking I had made a mistake with amounts, but not so. 4 cans of tomatoes, undrained is A LOT!

[sneezles]

Man that has got to be an error on CL's part! I like tomatoes but at only 4 servings (supposedly) that would be a can per person!

[Beth]

I agree -- and 4 cans would not fit in an 8-inch square pan without reduction.

[sunberst]

there has to be an error... 4 servings at a can a person? yikes! that is a lot of tomatoes!

sorry it did not work out well ralph. thanks for the post. maybe others have input.

[Ralph]

Originally posted by sneezles
at only 4 servings (supposedly) that would be a can per person!

I didn't even notice that! Shows you how addled my brain was yesterday from a computer crash!

[pilgrim719]

That's really weird that the recipe would be so far off for the pan size. Not to mention the 4 cans of tomatoes for 4 servings! I wonder if you run the ingredients through MC, and enter 4 servings, if it would work out to the same numbers printed in the CL magazine?

All that aide, I'm sorry to see a negative review of this recipe, as I thought it sounded pretty good when I flipped through the new issue. I wonder what would make it so sweet?

Kari

[HRJ]

I'm disappointed to hear this, too -- this was on my to-try list. I did wonder about the 4 small (14.4 oz) cans of tomatoes, though -- I bought 2 large (28 oz) cans to use in this recipe, since it was cheaper than buying 4 smaller cans. Guess I should think about putting them to some other use. Thanks for the tip, Ralph.

Helene

[knunes]

Funny you should comment about the amount. I made HALF of this recipe the other night for two of us, and was looking for a smaller than 8x8 pan, then thought to myself, "This looks like it will fit just fine in an 8x8 pan and won't be too little." It was just right for half the recipe.
We did not find the sauce to be sweet, but we didn't feel like the dish was a keeper either. We thought it was okay,definitely not BAD, but it was nothing I'd go out of my way to make again. I'd have been just as happy boiling some pasta and throwing on a jar of sauce that I had jazzed up a bit, and that would have been even easier!.
Also, my husband and I each had a normal size serving, my DD (age 9) ate a kid-size serving and there was still enough left over for DH to eat tonight (when I deserted him to go to a gourmet restaurant with friends! )

[summer02]

I thought that I had made a mistake some where along the line...I even tried to make it fit into the 8x8 pan. What a mess. And it wasn't even worth the struggle. My mistake was not thinking about the recipe as I made it and just dumping in all of the tomatoes.
Mine was super sweet since I usually add splenda in with my tomatoes to cut the acid taste a little - it's such a habit that I didn't even taste before I added the splenda.

[sneezles]

Originally posted by pilgrim719
That's really weird that the recipe would be so far off for the pan size. Not to mention the 4 cans of tomatoes for 4 servings! I wonder if you run the ingredients through MC, and enter 4 servings, if it would work out to the same numbers printed in the CL magazine?

All that aide, I'm sorry to see a negative review of this recipe, as I thought it sounded pretty good when I flipped through the new issue. I wonder what would make it so sweet?

Kari

I did enter just the ingredients becasue I had wondered the same thing and got this:

Per Serving (excluding unknown items): 352 Calories; 8g Fat (20.1% calories from fat); 17g Protein; 56g Carbohydrate; 8g Dietary Fiber; 66mg Cholesterol; 1155mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1/2 Grain(Starch); 1 Lean Meat; 8 Vegetable; 1 Fat.

I still think it has possibilities if you upped the herbs (with stove top cooking and then 30 minutes at 400º that's a lot of heat for dried herbs to handle), I would increase the black pepper (I mean why bother with only 1/8 tsp), use 2 cans diced tomatoes and up the wine to 1/2 cup...JMHO !

[JLS]

I made this today, and thought it was pretty good. (Not sure if I'd repeat, but then again, I don't repeat many recipes.)

I upped all the spices, nixed the green pepper, doubled the onion and before I added the mozzarella cheese, I added 2 teaspoons of parmasean. And I thought the flavor was just right, not too sweet. I also used 4 cheese ravioli.

I halved the recipe and dumped it into a large oval baking dish, and it filled it too the brim. (I cooked it on a cookie sheet, to avoid a mess!)