Cupeta

A hard almond brittle poured between wafers or onto lemon leaves while still molten.

Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains honey.

Ingredients

• 300 g whole almonds, toasted
• 250 g caster sugar
• 150 g honey
• the zest of 1 lemon
• a little oil, for the surface

Method

1. Toast the almonds and keep them WARM in a low oven. Cold almonds dropped into molten sugar set it instantly and you cannot spread the mixture at all.
2. Oil a marble slab or a baking sheet and a rolling pin.
3. Melt the sugar and honey together in a heavy pan over a medium heat WITHOUT STIRRING. Swirl the pan instead. Stirring makes the sugar crystallise and the brittle turns grainy and cloudy rather than clear.
4. Cook until it is the colour of dark honey, about 8 minutes. Watch it rather than timing it: the last thirty seconds take it from amber to burnt.
5. Tip the warm almonds and lemon zest in and stir once, quickly.
6. Pour it onto the oiled surface and roll or press it out to about 1 cm WHILE IT IS STILL MOLTEN. You have perhaps forty seconds; after that it is a solid lump and reheating it turns it bitter.
7. Mark it into squares with an oiled knife while still warm, then break along the lines once cold.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Italy · All recipes