Ricotta cheese pizza sauce

A few day ago, I alluded to how I use a homemade ricotta cheese pizza sauce on my pizzas. Many of you were interested in the recipe.

I’m not overly fond of tomatoes, so when it comes to pizza sauce I opt for alternatives such as pesto sauce, Alfredo sauce, etc. When I came across a recipe for a garlicky ricotta cheese sauce, I decided to try it. Don was stopping at the grocery store in town, so I asked him to get me a container of ricotta. The recipe turned out terrific, and I decided I wanted to make a large batch, which I could then freeze into one-pizza serving sizes.

But when I went to the store to get a larger quantity of ricotta and saw the actual price Don had paid, I had an absolute snit-fit – $9 for two pounds, and I wanted at least four pounds of ricotta to make a large batch of pizza sauce. There was no way I was paying that price!

I’d never made ricotta before, but I’m getting a gallon of milk a day, so purchasing the store-bought stuff was, admittedly, a lazy move. Time to learn how to make my own.

Whole-milk ricotta requires only two ingredients (or possibly four, depending on what recipe you follow): Milk and an acidifier. Salt is optional, though it enhances the flavor and helps coagulate the milk proteins. Adding a bit of heavy cream to the milk creates a richer, silkier ricotta.

I started by pouring a gallon of whole milk into a pot. It’s best not to use skim milk for making ricotta, as the results will be a cheese that is too dry.

I heated the milk (slowly) to between 185F to 195F.  This step takes 20 to 30 minutes or even longer, and is not a step to be rushed. I stirred the milk periodically.

Once the milk reached temperature, I added the acidifier. There are several different kinds of acidifiers that can be used, including citric acid (mixed with water), apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, or distilled white vinegar. Distilled white vinegar is the default acidifier and works extremely well. I used about two-thirds of a cup per gallon of milk.

After the acidifier is added, the curds should start separating from the whey almost immediately. You can see how the milk started curdling.

Then it was time to cover the pot and let the curds rest for anywhere from 20 minutes to two hours. The longer this resting period, the more curds will form. The curds should not be stirred during this resting period.

Next, I drained the ricotta. The longer it drains, the drier it will become. For a creamier consistency, it should be drained for one to two hours. For a firmer ricotta, drain it for around 24 hours. Somewhat arbitrarily, I drained mine for about four hours.

Here is what the final result looked like.

Trying to use up milk (and maximize the amount of pizza sauce), I made a second batch of ricotta the next day. I ended up with 3.5 lbs (56 ounces) of ricotta.

I stored this in the refrigerator overnight, then made pizza sauce the next day.

The recipe for ricotta white sauce is easy: Eight parts ricotta, four parts cream (or half and half), one part olive oil, and spices to taste. For one pizza, for example, the recipe called for one-half cup ricotta, one-quarter cup of cream, and one tablespoon olive oil (plus spices).

I had 56 ounces of ricotta, therefore I needed to add 28 ounces of cream or half and half (1.75 lbs.) and seven ounces of olive oil. It’s worth noting that I measured the cream and olive oil by weight, not volume. Then I added salt, pepper, minced garlic, and basil until the taste was satisfactory. (Your choice of flavorings may vary.)

Adding cream to the ricotta:

Blending the ricotta with the cream was challenging because the ricotta was so thick. I used a potato masher to start…

…then graduated to beaters to blend all the rest of the ingredients and make a sauce.

The final sauce was somewhat lumpy from the ricotta, and that’s as it should be.

Then I bagged it up in one-cup measurements for freezing.

In retrospect, I should have bagged up more per bag, anywhere from 1.5 to 2 cups. At any rate, it freezes well.

Labeling.

Now, whenever I make pizza, I can just reach for a bag, defrost it in the refrigerator overnight, and make pizza the next day.

So that’s the trick for ricotta cheese pizza sauce. This is my kind of convenience food.

Source: http://www.rural-revolution.com/2026/10/ricotta-cheese-pizza-sauce.html