1. Preheat the oven to 180° C / 355° F and place walnuts on a large baking tray. Allow them to toast in the oven for about 8-10 minutes, until golden and fragrant. Set aside to cool.
2. While the walnuts are roasting, cut the beetroots into quarters. Mix olive oil and 1 tbsp of balsamic in a small bowl and coat the beetroot.
3. Increase the oven temperature to 200° C / 390° F.
4. Place the beetroot and 3 pierced (or else they will explode) garlic cloves on a small tray. Bake for about 25 minutes, giving them a stir halfway through and removing garlic from the tray (it should be soft by that point). Allow the beetroots to cool down.
5. Place cooled walnuts in a food processor and grind finely but be careful not to overdo it as they will eventually start turning into walnut paste (walnut butter). Remove the walnuts from the food processor and set about ¼ cup aside for the garnish.
6. Place beetroot, squeezed out garlic cloves and nutritional yeast in the food processor. Process until smooth. Add most of the ground walnuts to thicken, then season with salt, pepper, nutmeg and an extra tablespoon of balsamic vinegar if desired. The walnuts should thicken the mixture enough that it is no longer wet and runny. You may want to add a tablespoon or two of fine breadcrumbs to thicken it even further.

PASTA DOUGH (or GF PASTA DOUGH here)

1. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, salt, xantham gum (if using GF flour mix) and turmeric. Make a well in the centre and add olive oil and aquafaba (or water). Mix it all with a spoon until it roughly sticks together. You may need to add a touch more aquafaba (or water) if the dough is too dry, if too wet, add a bit more flour.
2. Knead the dough for 10 minutes and then set aside for 30-60 minutes under a damp kitchen towel so that the dough doesn’t dry up.
3. Once the dough has had a chance to rest, take one quarter of the dough and roll it out with a rolling pin on a lightly floured surface. Roll it out as thin as you can (2-3 mm), the thinner the dough the tastier the ravioli. You can obviously use a pasta machine to roll out your dough if you have one (I don’t).
4. Place one pasta sheet on a lightly floured surface, use a glass or a cookie cutter (I used 7 cm / 2.75″ diameter one) to cut out circles. Make small blobs (½ tsp as it’s important not to overfill) of filling in the middle of each circle. Fold each circle in half around the filling ensuring there are no air pockets in the dumpling or else it will burst during cooking.
5. Put the finished ravioli on a lightly floured surface and cover them with a kitchen towel while making the rest so that they don’t dry out. Continue in the same way until you have used up all the dough and / or all the filling.
6. Bring a medium pot of water to boil. Once the water boils, place a few ravioli (do not overcrowd the pot) in the boiling water and cook, on a rolling boil, for about 5 minutes. After the time is up, fish cooked ravioli out with a slotted spoon, shaking excess water off gently, and place them on a plate. Cook all the remaining ravioli in this way.
7. To serve, baste them in garlicky olive oil and finish off with walnut crumb and fresh thyme leaves.