Tortellini vs. Ravioli

I decided to write about this topic, because recently I realized that many people still think today that tortellini and ravioli are completely different dishes. Working in a small Italian restaurant on weekends one day a customer ordered meat-filled tortellini with mushroom sauce. Unfortunately we run out of tortellini and offered him meat-filled ravioli instead. The customer refused and asked for another dish.

Dear pasta lovers,

Tortellini are round in shape and have a hole inside, whereas Ravioli are square in shape with no hole inside them.  Both of them are prepared from the same pasta and the only difference is the shape. In both, Tortellini and Ravioli’s stuffing could be: meat, vegetable, fish or creamy cheeses, etc.

Yours faithfully

A bit of history

In earlier times, tortellini and ravioli were considered to be delicacies to be eaten only on weekends as they were considerably expensive. In those times, the stuffing was vegetable based as poor could not afford meat all the time.