How many of us spend this quarantine in the kitchen experimenting with new recipes? Coldiretti has announced a boom in sales of flour and yeast. It shows that most Italians have completely moved to the kitchen. So, we give you a tasty recipe suitable for Easter: pastiera!
History and ingredients
The Neapolitan tradition has it that it is prepared on Holy Thursday and enjoy it on Saturday and Sunday. But, first of all, where does the Pastiera come from? Legend says that some fishermen’s wives left baskets full of ricotta, candied fruit, wheat and eggs on the beach. A sort of offer to the sea to let their husbands return home safely. The next day, however, the waves of water, which beat on the shore during the night, had mixed the ingredients, leaving the pastiera on the sand, a pleasant surprise.
For the shortbread pastry:
- 2 eggs
- 100 g sugar
- 120 g butter
- 350 g plain flour
For the filling:
- 250 g cooked wheat
- 200 ml milk
- 250 g sugar
- 3 eggs (separate the yolks from the whites)
- 250 g ricotta
- 1 sachet of vanilla flavouring
- lemon zest
- 10-20 ml millefiori
- candied fruit
Procedure
Let’s start by preparing the shortcrust pastry. In a bowl, combine butter into small pieces with the eggs and sugar. Knead and gradually add the flour. Pour the dough on a pastry board and knead quickly, until the dough is uniform, elastic and smooth. Our shortcrust pastry is ready to be wrapped in cling film and chill for about 30 minutes. In the meantime, let’s prepare the filling. First of all, we should cook the wheat. We pour it into a saucepan together with milk and lemon peel. We mix and bring on the fire until the wheat has absorbed all the milk. It will take about 10-15 minutes, turn off the heat and remove the lemon peel.
And now we prepare the other part of the filling. In a bowl, pour ricotta, sugar, egg yolks and beaten egg whites. We incorporate the cooked wheat (to make the mixture creamier we can blend part of it). Add the millefiori aroma and candied fruit. Roll out 2/3 of the shortcrust pastry and line a greased and floured baking pan 26 cm in diameter. We pour our filling and with the rest of the dough we make some strips to garnish the tart. Cook in a preheated static oven at 170 ° for 50 minutes, then at 160 ° C for 15 minutes. Sprinkle with icing sugar (if you like) and our pastiera is ready!
A variant of the pastiera
Pastry cream added to the filling makes it even more tasty. Just use ½ l of milk, 2 yolks, 4 tablespoons of sugar, 4 of flour and the zest of one lemon. Pour the milk, together with the lemon peel, into a saucepan and let it warm up. In a large pot, combine the yolks with the sugar and flour to form a smooth, lump-free mixture. At this point we add the boiling milk. We bring on the fire, and continue stirring, until the cream thickens well. So let’s prepare and enjoy it!
#Italyintheheart
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