Rustico Leccese

Two puff pastry discs sealed round mozzarella and thick besciamella.

Egg. Not vegetarian — contains mozzarella whose rennet the source does not name.

Ingredients

• 2 sheets all-butter puff pastry
• 250 g mozzarella, diced and drained overnight
• 300 ml thick besciamella
• 150 g passata, cooked down
• nutmeg
• black pepper
• 1 egg, beaten, to glaze
• 1 teaspoon salt

Method

1. DRAIN THE MOZZARELLA OVERNIGHT and cook the passata right down. Both are mostly water and both are going inside sealed pastry — the commonest failure here is a soggy base and a burst seam.
2. Make the besciamella much thicker than usual, stiff enough to hold a spoon upright, and cool it completely.
3. Cut 10 cm discs from both pastry sheets, two per rustico.
4. On the base disc put besciamella, then mozzarella, then a teaspoon of the thick tomato, nutmeg and pepper, leaving a 2 cm border bare.
5. Lay the second disc on and SEAL BY PRESSING THE EDGE WITH A FORK ALL ROUND. No vent: the filling is meant to steam inside and the pastry to dome.
6. Brush with egg and bake at 200C for 25 minutes until deep gold and risen.
7. Rest 10 minutes. They are eaten hot from paper, and the inside is molten, so warn whoever is eating.

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