Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (75 page)

120 grams (about 4-1/4 ounces) of sweet almonds

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of powdered sugar

Blanch the almonds, separate the lobes (in other words, the two parts where they are naturally joined), and cut into slivers lengthwise or crosswise, whichever you prefer. Put these slivered almonds on the fire and dry them until they turn yellowish, but don’t toast them. In the meantime, put the sugar on the fire in a saucepan (avoid using a tin-plated pan if possible), and when it’s completely liquefied, add the almonds (still nice and hot), and mix. Be sure at this point to throw a shovelful of ashes on the coals so that the almond brittle
doesn’t turn out bitter because it’s been overcooked. You can tell that it’s done when it becomes cinnamon colored. Then pour a little at a time into any kind of mold greased with butter or oil, and use a lemon to press it against the sides, forming a layer as thin as possible. When it has cooled, remove from the mold, and should it be difficult to do so, immerse the mold in boiling water. Some people dry the almonds in the sun, chop them very fine with a mezzaluna, and add a bit of butter after adding them to the sugar.

This cake, which could more properly be called sponge cake with filling, makes a handsome sight in the windows of confectioners’ shops. To those untrained in the art of baking, it might seem to be a very fancy dish, but it really isn’t at all difficult to make.

Make a sponge cake using the following ingredients and bake in a large baking pan (rectangular if possible) greased with butter and dusted with flour. The cake should be half a finger high.

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of powdered sugar

170 grams (about 6 ounces) of very fine flour

6 eggs

In this and similar cases, some cookbooks suggest drying the flour in the sun or on the fire before using it, perhaps to make it lighter.

Work the egg yolks with the sugar for about half an hour and then add the egg whites, beaten thoroughly. When you have gently folded in the whites, sift the flour onto this mixture, or use the method described in recipe 588. Remove from the oven, and while the cake is still hot cut it into a sufficient number of strips two centimeters wide and as long as the remaining piece of sponge cake, for which they will be used as filling. But to give these strips a nice appearance, they should be different colors. So sprinkle some of them with white rosolio,
¹¹⁰
and they’ll turn yellow; others with alkermes,
¹¹¹
and they will turn red; dye the last ones black with white rosolio marinated with chocolate. Arrange the dyed strips of sponge cake in alternating colors one on top of the other in the middle of the remaining piece of cake, which you have spread with fruit preserves. Spread the fruit preserves on the strips of cake as well, so that they’ll stay in place. Pull the edges of the large piece of sponge cake over the strips of cake to form a compact roll. When the roll is sliced, You’ll see the multicolored checkerboard filling.

You can make a simpler version of this cake for your family in the following manner; even half of the ingredients will be sufficient for a large baking pan.

Spread the sponge cake with rosolio and fruit preserves—it doesn’t matter whether you use quince, apricot, or peach. Arrange thin strips of candied fruit on top of this, and then roll the whole piece of cake up on itself.

Either way you make it, it’s a good idea to decorate the top of the cake with either a lacework of sugar or with chocolate icing, as the confectioners do. But those gentlemen have certain secrets for making such things to perfection—secrets that they don’t willingly share. But it just so happens that I know one of their special processes, which you will find described in recipe 789.

In the meantime, You’ll just have to content yourself with the following method, which is simpler, if not quite perfect:

Mix some confectioners’ sugar with egg whites until very firm, and then spread over the cake evenly or put the mixture in a piping bag and squeeze until it comes out of the small hole at the bottom. Pipe the icing all over the top of the cake, making any design you like. If you want dark icing, take 60 grams (about 2 ounces) of powdered sugar and 30 grams (about 1 ounce) of powdered chocolate, mix, blend thoroughly with beaten egg whites, and spread over the cake. If it doesn’t harden by itself, expose it to moderate heat.

The specialty sweets of Siena are panforte, ricciarelli, cavallucci, and cupate. Cavallucci are little pastries shaped liked mostaccioli, as shown in the following diagram. You can see that they have nothing to do
with horses, and I don’t think that they even know why they’re called that in Siena, a city, as the saying goes,
where three things abound: towers, hells, and quintains
.
¹¹²

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In this recipe I want to give you a close, but not exact imitation of Sienese cavallucci—we’ve got the flavor just about right, but the consistency leaves something to be desired, which is only natural. When something is made in large quantities and with methods that are kept secret from the uninitiated, any imitation is bound to falter.

300 grams (about 10-1/2 ounces) of flour

300 grams (about 10-1/2 ounces) of blond sugar

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of shelled walnuts

50 grams (about 1-2/3 ounces) of candied orange

15 grams (about 1/2 of an ounce) of aniseed

5 grams (about 1/5 of an ounce) of spices and cinnamon powder

Chop the walnuts into pieces about the size of beans. Dice the candied orange. Put the sugar on the fire with a third of its weight in water, and when it has reached the point where it threads from the spoon, add all of the other ingredients and blend. Pour the hot mixture over the flour on a pastry board—but to do this, You’ll see that You’ll need more flour to give the dough the right consistency. Then form the cavallucci, of which, with these amounts, you should get more than 40. Since the dough is quite sticky on account of the sugar, dust the cookies all over with flour. Place in a baking pan and bake them plain, at moderate heat. Be very careful when you cook the sugar, because it will turn dark if it cooks too much. Pick up a drop between your thumb and index finger, and if it starts to form a thread, it’s cooked enough for this recipe.

220 grams (about 7-3/4 ounces) of fine white sugar

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of sweet almonds

20 grams (about 2/3 of an ounce) of bitter almonds

2 egg whites

orange zest

Blanch the almonds, dry them in the sun or on the fire, and crush very fine in a mortar with two tablespoons of the sugar, added a little at a time. Then add the rest of the sugar and mix thoroughly.

Beat the egg whites in any type of bowl and pour in the crushed almonds and the orange rind, grated. Mix again with a wooden spoon and pour the mixture onto a pastry board over a thin layer of flour, just enough so that only the very little bit of flour necessary to roll out of a soft, flat sheet of dough half a finger thick sticks to it. Then cut out the cookies in the shape indicated below, and You’ll get between 16 and 19 cookies. Bake in the following manner:

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Take a baking pan, make a layer of bran as thick as a coin, and cover it entirely with wafers, on which you will place the ricciarelli. Bake in the oven at moderate heat so that they stay tender. If you don’t have an oven, which it the best way to bake them, use a Dutch oven.

When they’re done, cut off the excess wafer around the edges of each cookie, which will turn out of quite high quality.

Put in a saucepan:

80 grams (about 2-2/3 ounces) of flour

30 grams (about one ounce) of blond sugar

20 grams (about 2/3 of an ounce) of virgin lard, barely tepid

seven tablespoons cold water

First dissolve the flour and sugar in the water, then add the lard.

Put a waffle iron over a hot burner, and when it’s nice and hot open it and pour in half a tablespoon of the batter at a time. Press the two sides of the iron together, hold over the fire first on one side and then on the other, use a knife to remove the excess batter that has oozed out, and open the iron when you know that the wafer has become light brown. Loosen it a bit on one side with a knife, and then, using a little rod or just your hands, roll it up right away, on the iron itself or on a cloth spread out on the hearth. This last operation must be done very quickly, because once the wafer has cooled you won’t be able to roll it up.

If the wafers stick to the waffle iron, grease it from time to time with lard, and if they don’t come out whole, add a little more flour.

You already know that sweet wafers can be served by themselves; but it’s better to accompany them with whipped cream or even with milk
brûlé
(recipe 692) or Portuguese-style milk (recipe 693).

These sweets are usually made for the Day of the Dead, and they take the place of the
baggiana
, the garden-variety fava bean, which is typically cooked in water with a ham bone for this occasion. This custom must have originated in antiquity, since the fava bean was used as an offering to the Fates, Pluto, and Persephone, and was famous for the superstitious ceremonies in which it was used. The ancient Egyptians abstained from eating the fava; they didn’t plant it, nor did they touch it with their hands. Their priests wouldn’t even dare to look upon it, deeming it a vile thing. Fava beans, especially black favas, were used as a funeral offering because it was believed that they contained the souls of the dead, and were similar to the gates of Hell.

During the feasts of the
Lemures,
¹¹³
people would spit out black fava beans while beating a copper pot, to chase out of their homes the spirits of their ancestors, the souls of the departed, and the infernal deities.

Festus
¹¹⁴
claimed that there was a funereal sign on the flowers of this legume; and they say that that the custom of offering fava beans to the dead was one of the reasons that Pythagoras ordered his students to abstain from eating them; another reason was to prevent them from getting involved in government affairs, since fava beans were used for balloting in elections.

There are several ways to make sweet favas. Here are three different recipes: the first two are family style; the third is more refined.

First recipe

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of flour

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of sugar

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of sweet almonds

30 grams (about one ounce) of butter

1 egg

a dash of lemon zest, or cinnamon, or orange-flower water

Second recipe

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of sweet almonds

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of flour

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of sugar

30 grams (about 1 ounce) of butter

1 egg

flavoring, as above

Third recipe

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of sweet almonds

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of confectioners’ sugar

2egg whites

lemon zest or other flavoring

For the first two recipes, blanch the almonds and crush them with the sugar until they are half as big as a grain of rice. Put them in the middle of the flour along with the other ingredients, and make a soft dough using as much rosolio or brandy as necessary. Then make the dough into small pastries shaped like large fava bean; you should get 60 or 70 for each recipe. Arrange in a baking pan greased with lard or butter and dusted with flour; gild with egg yolk. Bake in the oven or Dutch oven. Remember that since they are so small, they bake very quickly. For the third recipe, dry the almonds in the sun or on the fire and crush them very fine in a mortar, adding the egg whites a little at a time. Lastly, add the sugar and, using your hand, mix together. Pour the dough onto a pastry board over a thin layer of flour. Shape into a long roll and cut it into forty or more pieces. Shape like fava beans and bake as in the preceding recipes.