Pastiera Napoletana

A wheat-and-ricotta tart under a lattice, left three days before it is cut.

Egg. Not vegetarian — contains lard, ricotta whose rennet the source does not name.

Ingredients

• 300 g cooked wheat berries
• 250 ml whole milk
• 500 g sheep's ricotta, drained
• 350 g caster sugar
• 5 eggs
• 100 g candied orange and citron peel, diced
• 2 tablespoons orange flower water
• zest of 1 orange, cinnamon
• 400 g plain flour, for the pastry
• 200 g lard, for the pastry
• 150 g caster sugar, for the pastry
• 2 egg yolks, for the pastry
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Method

1. Cook the wheat berries gently IN THE MILK with a little sugar for 40 minutes, stirring, until the milk is gone and the grains have burst into a thick cream. Cool completely.
2. Make a short pastry with the flour, lard, sugar, yolks and salt — lard, not butter, which gives the sandy texture this wants — and chill it an hour.
3. Beat the drained ricotta with the sugar, pass it through a sieve, then beat in the eggs one at a time.
4. Fold in the wheat cream, candied peel, zest, cinnamon and the ORANGE FLOWER WATER. Two tablespoons is correct and it will smell overwhelming in the bowl; it settles to a background over the days of resting.
5. Line a deep tin, fill it, and LAY SEVEN STRIPS OF PASTRY ACROSS IN A LATTICE. Seven, in two directions, which is how the tart is recognised.
6. Bake at 170C for 1 hour 30 minutes until the top is deep brown and the filling barely moves. It will crack, which is correct.
7. COOL IT AND LEAVE IT TWO OR THREE DAYS before cutting. It is dry and separate on the day it is baked, and only becomes itself once the filling has settled and the pastry softened from inside.

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