Cooking our Pasta


Cooking fresh pasta is very different to cooking dried pasta. If you're using fresh pasta for the first time, it's important to know that it doesn't take long at all to cook.  Life is too short for gluggy pasta (and bad wine), so follow these instructions to ensure that your Maria's Pasta is perfetto every time!

Fresh Lasagna Sheets

Durum lasagna sheets

Maria's lasagna sheets are revered by chefs in some of Melbourne's top restaurants. To use the sheets in your own lasagna, we recommend pre-cooking them. Bring a generous-sized pot of water to the boil, salted to taste. Add pasta. Bring water back to the boil and gently boil for 3 minutes. Remove from water, drain and add to your lasagna as required.

You can also use uncooked sheets in lasagna. For best results, ensure you have additional liquid in your sauce, cook immediately once assembling your lasagna and bake, covered for about 50 minutes at 180 degrees.

For making your own cannelloni, follow the instructions above to pre-cook the sheets. Pre-cook them whole before cutting to the required size for your cannelloni, as the sheets will expand when cooked. Add your own filling, roll them up and cook per the cannelloni instructions shown below.

Fresh Cut Pasta

spaghetti, linguine, fettuccine, tagliatelle, pappardelle 

Fresh cut pasta

Bring a generous-sized pot of salted water to the boil. Add pasta. Bring water back to the boil and gently boil for the following times:

Spaghetti - Approximately 1.5 - 2 minutes

Linguine, Fettuccine & Tagliatelle - Approximately 2-3 minutes

Pappadelle - Approximately 3-4 minutes

If the pasta has been thinned then reduce the cooking time by approximately 30seconds to 1 minute.

Drain and immediately coat with sauce or oil and serve.

Frozen Filled Pasta

ravioli, tortellini, pinzati, small agnolotti, gnocchi

 Ravioli

Bring a generous-sized pot of water to the boil, salted to taste. Add pasta (no need to defrost). Bring water back to the boil and gently boil for the recommended time on the pack. Test a piece (particularly the edges) to ensure the pasta is cooked to your liking, cook for additional time if required. Drain and serve with sauce immediately.

Fresh Cannelloni

Fresh cannelloni

Line an oven proof tray with a spoonful of sauce and then arrange the cannelloni on a baking tray. Cover well with your favourite sauce then cover and bake at 180 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Remove cover, add grated cheese to the top and return to hot oven for another 5-10 minutes until cheese is melted and golden. 

Fresh Handmade Jumbo Agnolotti

Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil. Gently place jumbo agnolotti into the water one at a time. Once the water is back to the boil, simmer gently for approximately 12 minutes. Check to see if the edges are cooked and once they are just cooked, spoon them into a pasta drainer and cover with sauce immediately to prevent sticking.

Ravioli with 3 cheese

Cooking times vary so please refer to the cooking instructions on the packet.

If you have any questions, our friendly staff are here to help! Call us on 03 9380 5800.