Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (76 page)

3 kilos (about 6 pounds) of quinces

2 kilos (about 4 pounds) of fine white sugar

Cover the quinces with water and put them on the fire; when they begin to shrivel, remove from the fire, peel, and grate them as best you can to remove all the pulp, which you will then strain through a sieve. Put back on the fire with the sugar, and stir constantly so that it doesn’t stick. Seven or eight minutes cooking time should be sufficient, but the moment it starts to fall in threads from a wooden spoon, remove it from the fire. If you put it in jars, you can use it as a jam; that way it will stay whiter than it does in the way I’ll describe to you in recipe 741, but it will be less fragrant because some of the fruit’s aroma is lost when you cook it in water.

To turn it into jelly, take a board and spread the quince paste on it to about the thickness of a coin and dry it in the sun; but cover it with a thin cloth, because flies and wasps just love it. When it’s dry on top, cut it into the shape of little chocolate bars, and then use a knife to loosen them from the board and turn them over.

Should you want to give them unusual shapes, get some tin pastry cutters that are open on both sides, fill them with the quince paste, smooth them out, and carefully remove the excess from the edges of the pastry cutters; place them on a board and dry them as above.

You can also glaze them, if you wish. Boil 100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of white sugar with two tablespoons of water, and when it has cooked enough to form a thread when you take a drop between two fingers, use a brush to spread each piece with this icing. If the sugar starts to thicken on you while you’re icing the pieces (which it’s good to do when it’s not a humid day), put it back on the fire with another drop of water and bring it to a boil again. When the sugar glaze has dried on the sides and top, turn over the pieces and glaze the other side.

Here’s a dish that’s usually made during Lent.

Take 300 grams (about 10-1/2 ounces) of dried chickpeas (I specify dried, because in Tuscany they’re sold softened in the water from salt cod).

Soak the chickpeas overnight in cool water, and the next morning add 7 or 8 dried chestnuts; put on the fire in an earthenware pan with cool water and 3 grams (about 1/10 of an ounce) of baking soda tied in a piece of cheesecloth. This is what people call “the secret trick,” and it makes cooking chickpeas easier. Instead of baking soda, you can also use lye water: the evening before, put the chickpeas in any type of jar, and cover the mouth of the jar with a cloth on which you’ve placed a shovelful of ashes; pour boiling water through the cloth until the chickpeas are covered. The next morning, remove the chickpeas from the lye water and rinse thoroughly with cool water before you put them on the fire.

When the chickpeas are cooked, remove them from the water and strain them through a sieve while they’re still piping hot, along with the chestnuts. If in spite of the “secret trick” with the baking soda or the lye water they’re still too hard, crush them in a mortar. After you’ve strained them, season with a pinch of salt, enough cooked must
¹¹⁵
to soften the mixture, half a jar of Savignano mostarda
¹¹⁶
(or the relish described in recipe 788), 40 grams (about 1/3 of an ounce) of candied fruit in small pieces, a little sugar if the must hasn’t sweetened the chickpeas enough, and two teaspoons of ground cinnamon.

If you don’t have a horse, you try to get your donkey to trot: and in this case, if you have neither cooked must nor mostarda (for my tastes, the best mostarda is the one from the town of Savignano in the Romagna region), you can substitute 80 grams (about 2-2/3 ounces) of sugar for the former and 7 grams (less than 1/3 of an ounce) of powdered mustard dissolved in the hot water in which you cooked the chickpeas for the latter.

Now We’ll go on to the dough in which You’ll put the filling. You can half the recipe for cenci, no. 595, or else use the following ingredients:

270 grams (about 9-1/2 ounces) of flour

20 grams (about 2/3 of an ounce) of butter

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

1 egg

about 3 tablespoons of white wine or Marsala

a pinch of salt

Roll out a sheet of dough about the thickness of half a coin and cut with the round, scalloped pastry cutter shown in recipe 614. Put plenty of filling in the disks of pastry, fold and press the edges together, and shape each one like a crescent moon. Fry in lard or oil, and when they’re done, sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar.

You can use the water from the chickpeas to make soup or to cook store-bought pasta, as they do in Tuscany.

These fritters are so good that nobody will guess that they’re made with chickpeas.

Here’s a very delicate, dainty cake.

150 grams (about 5-l/4 ounces) of sweet almonds

150 grams (about 5-l/4 ounces) of sugar

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

3 eggs

1-1/2 oranges

First beat the egg yolks with the sugar, add the flour and then the almonds, blanched and crushed fine and mixed with a tablespoon of the sugar. Squeeze the juice from the oranges and scrape the outer peel from only one of them, and add. Lastly, fold in the egg whites, beaten. Pour into a paper box a finger and a half deep greased with butter, and bake in the oven at a moderate temperature. After it’s done, cover with a white icing as in recipe 789.

250 grams (about 8-4/5 ounces) of white powdered sugar

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

50 grams (about 1 -2/3 ounces) of bitter almonds

2 egg whites

Blanch the almonds and dry in the sun or on the fire. Then chop very fine with a mezzaluna. Using a wooden spoon, beat the sugar and the egg whites for at least half an hour. Add the crushed almonds and work the mixture into a firm dough, with which you can form little balls the size of a small walnut. If the dough is too soft, add some more sugar, and if it’s too hard, add some more egg white, beaten. If you’d like to give the macaroons a brownish color, stir a little burnt sugar into the mixture.

As you form the balls, which You’ll flatten to a thickness of one centimeter (about half an inch), place them on wafers, or else on little pieces of paper, or in a baking pan greased with butter and dusted with a mixture of one part flour and one part confectioners’ sugar. But be sure to keep the balls a good distance from each other, because they spread out quite a bit and puff up, remaining empty inside.

Bake in the oven at moderate heat.

Here’s another recipe for macaroons that I think are better than ones in the preceding recipe, and they’re easier to make.

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

180 grams (about 6-1/3 ounces) of sweet almonds

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

2 egg whites

Blanch the almonds and dry in the sun or on the fire; then crush fine in a mortar with one egg white, added a little at a time. Once this is done, mix in half the sugar, and crumble the mixture with one hand. Then pour it into a bowl, and continuing to work it with your hand so that it blends well, add half an egg white, then the other half of
the sugar, and then the last half egg white.

In this way You’ll get a smooth mixture that’s just the right consistency, which you can shape into a roll and slice into equal pieces. Pick them up one by one (moisten your hands so that they don’t stick) and form little balls about the size of walnuts. Flatten the balls until they’re a centimeter (about half an inch) thick and then proceed as in the last recipe, but sprinkle lightly with confectioners’ sugar before you put them in a hot oven. I say oven and not Dutch oven, which wouldn’t do for this dough.

You should get about thirty macaroons with this recipe.

Make a shortcrust pastry dough with recipe 589 C.

Make a marzipan like the one in recipe 579, with the following proportions:

180 grams (about 6-1/3 ounces) of blanched sweet almonds and 3 bitter almonds

150 grams (about 5-1/4 ounces) of sugar

25 grams (about 4/5 of an ounce) of butter

25 grams (about 4/5 of an ounce) of candied orange

an egg yolk

several tablespoons of water

Use little molds like the ones for individual brioches, or somewhat smaller, which would be better. Grease the molds with butter, line with a layer of the shortcrust pastry about as thick as a coin, fill will the marzipan, fold the edges of the pastry dough over, moisten the edges with water, cover with more pastry dough, gild the top, bake in the oven or Dutch oven and afterwards sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar.

With these amounts you will be able to make between 16 and 18 pastries.

180 grams (about 6-1/3 ounces) of semolina

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

50 grams (about 1-2/3 ounces) of pine nuts

20 grams (about 2/3 of an ounce) of butter

8 deciliters (about 3-1/3 cups) of milk

4 eggs

a pinch of salt

lemon zest

Cook the semolina in the milk, and when it begins to thicken, pour in the pine nuts after crushing them in a mortar with the sugar. Then add the butter and the other ingredients, except for the eggs, which You’ll keep for last when the mixture has cooled. From this point on, proceed as for the rice pastries in recipe 630.

With these amounts you can make 18 to 20 pastries.

Before serving, sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar.

150 grams (about 5-1/4 ounces) of rice

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

30 grams (about
7
ounce) of butter

30 grams (about 1 ounce) of candied fruit

8 deciliters (about 3-1/3 cups) of milk

3 eggs

2 tablespoons of rum

a pinch of salt

Cook the rice thoroughly in the milk, stirring often so that it doesn’t stick. When the rice is two-thirds cooked, pour in the sugar, butter, salt, and candied fruit, in tiny pieces. When the rice is done, let it cool and then add the rum, then the egg yolks, and lastly the egg whites, beaten.

Take little molds like the ones for individual brioches, grease well with butter, dust with bread crumbs, fill with the rice mixture and bake in a Dutch oven. they’re better warm than cold.

You can make 12 to 14 pastries with these amounts.

150 grams (about 5-1/4 ounces) of water

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

10 grams (about 1/3 of an ounce) of butter