With either a piping bag or a small pair of spoons, put a tiny
dollop (about 1 teaspoon) of filling at the center of each round.
You don’t want too much filling or it will ooze out. Continue
doing this until you have a table full of circle shapes with filling in
the middle.
With a spray bottle, mist everything lightly with water (or, if
you don’t have a spray bottle, dip your fingers in tepid water and
flick it all over the pasta): this will keep the pasta pliable and will
help it stick. To make the tortellini, fold a circle of dough in half.
Squeeze out all the air that surrounds the filling and pinch the
edges tightly to make a seal. It should look a bit like a calzone.
Now, along the straight edge where the filling is, make a dent with
your finger. Fold this dent in on itself, bringing the edges together
and pinching them. That’s it: you’ve made a tortellini.
Continue doing this until you’ve used all the dough and most of
the filling, tossing the tortellini on a plate with some flour so they
don’t stick. You have two choices now: you can cook the tortellini
right away or freeze them for later. If you want to freeze them,
plop them onto a parchment-lined cookie sheet with some flour
and place them in the freezer for an hour. Then pluck them off the
sheet and put them in a freezer bag; they’ll keep that way for at
least a month. When you cook them from the freezer, drop them
straight into boiling water—no need to defrost.
To serve the tortellini immediately, bring a pot of water to a
boil. Season aggressively with salt (it should taste salty) and drop
in the tortellini. They take longer to cook than most fresh pasta