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Pumpkin tortelli
Christmas eve recipe from Mantua.
Amounts for 6 portions:
flour 600 gr. (1,3 lbm);
pumpkin 1 kg. (2,2 lbm);
Parma cheese 300 gr. (0,6 lbm);
macaroons 200 gr. (0,44 lbm);
candied citron 50 gr. (0,1 lbm);
fruit mustard gr. (0,33 lbm);
eggs nr. 6;
some butter, bread-crumbs, cinnamon and lemon-peel.
Choose a sweet floury pumpkin, bake it and then unflesh it.
Add cheese to pumpkin flesh, some bread-crumbs, the macaroons pounded in a mortar, candied citron and little pieces
of mustard. Mix everything with care. Then knead the flour and the eggs until you obtain a thin leaf. Cut small squares,
put on them the the dough and then close them. Cook the pieces in a lot of salt water, then serve with melted butter.
Merry Christmas!
Krapfes
A simple and very greedy recipe.
Amounts for about 20 pieces:
flour 200 gr. (0,44 lbm);
butter 50 gr. (0,11 lbm);
sugar 30 gr. (0,06 lbm);
beer yeast 15 gr. (0,03 lbm);
salt 2 gr. (0,004 lbm);
eggs nr. 2;
some milk.
Put yeast in a cup with a few tepid water and then,
with a spoon, knead it with 50 gr (0,11 lbm) of flour. The result is a soft dough that you've to leave
rising in a tepid place. This dough will be ready when its volume becomes double. With the last flour
(150 gr = 0,33 lbm) make like a volcano on the table and fill it with butter, two eggs, a spoon of granulated
sugar and a pinch of salt. Add the yeast of the cup and then knead everything, strongly slamming the dough
upon the table for ten minutes. The result is a single elastic piece. Put it in a little tureen covered with flour,
cover and leave it in a tepid place for about two hours. Then, put the dough on the table covered with a few
flour, spread it by hands and then fold it on itself three or four times. Fold the dough with a wood roller until
obtaining a 0,5 cm (0,2 in) thickness. Then, with a 5 cm (2 in) diameter glass, cut the dough to obtain about fourty
disks. Wet twenty disks with a few milk (or beaten egg) and put some apricot jam in the middle of a single
piece. Then cover it with a dry disk and, after pushing softly along the border of the double disk, leave the
obtained pieces on a large plate in a tepid place. After half an hour, fry the pieces in a lot of oil at low flame
until they appear like a big apple with a dark blond color. At last, let oil drip from krapfes and roll them in
granulated sugar. Have an happy lunch!