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Cookies with Nuts
Ricciarelli di Siena
Ricciarelli di Siena (Siense almond cookies, with sugar, egg whites, sweet and bitter almonds and orange zest)
Originated from: Siena, Tuscany
Occasion: Any time & special times
Contributed by: Taken from "La Scienza in Cucina e L'Arte di Mangiar Bene" compilato da Pellegrino Artusi (1891, 1907)

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Ingredients

200 grams (about 7 3/4 ounces) of fine white sugar
200 grams (about 7 ounces) of sweet almonds, blanched
20 grams of bitter (about 2/3 ounce) almonds, blanched
2 egg whites
orange zest, grated

Wafers for baking pan

Original Italian text
Zucchero biano fine, grammi 220.
Mandorle dolci, grammi 200.
Dette amare, grammi 20.
Chiare d'uovo, N. 2
Odore di buccia d'arancio.



Directions

Blanch the almonds, dry them, and grind them with two tablespoons of the sugar, added a little at a time.

Then add the rest of the sugar, and mix thoroughly.

Beat the egg whites and add the ground almonds and the grated orange rind.

Mix again with a wooden spoon and pour the mixture into a floured pastry board.

Then cut out the cookies in the [oval] shape indicated below [diagram shown in original text], and you'll get between 16 and 19 cookies.

Bake in the following manner:

Take a baking pan, place a layer of bran as thin as a coin, and cover it entirely with wafers, on which you will place the ricciarelli.

Bake in the oven at moderate heat so that they stay tender.

When they're done, cut off the excess wafer around the edges of each cookie, which should turn out to be of quite high quality.



Original Italian text

Sbucciate le mandorle, ascugatele bene al sole o al fuoco e pestatele finissime nel mortaio con due cucchiaiate del detto zucchero versato in diverse volte; poi uniteci il resto della zucchero mescolando bene.

Montate le chiare in un vaso qualunque e versateci le mandorle cosi preparale e la buccia dell'arancio grattata. Mescolate di nuovo con un mestolo e versaie il composto sulla spianatoia sopra a un leggiero strato di farina per fargliene prendere soltanto quella ben poca quantita che occorre per tirare leggermente col matterello una stiacciata morbida, grossa mezzo dito. Allora tagliateli con la forma que sotto segnata e ne otterrete da 16 a 18 per cuocerli nel seguente modo:

Prendete una teglia, fatele uno strato di crusca allo quanto uno scudo e copritelo tutto di cialde per posarvi su i ricciarelli e cuocerli al forno a moderato calore onde restino teneri. In mancanza del forno, che sarebbe il piu opportuno, servitevi del forno da compagna.

Dopo cotti tagliate via la cialda che sopravanza agli orli di queste paste, che riescono di qualita fine.


Notes

The recipe in this entry was taken from "La Scienza in Cucina e L'Arte di Mangiar Bene manuale Pratico per le Famiglie" compilato da Pellegrino Artusi. The book was first published in 1891. Since then many Italian editions have been published. Olga Ragusa's selection of recipes from Pellegrino Artusi's famous cookbook, titled "The Italian Cook Book," can be found in its entirety at www.archive.org (It's free). The University of Toronto recently published a new English edition of Pellegrino Artusi's "Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well"; many of the recipes in this edition can be found at www.books.google.ca.... The following text comes from WIKIPEDIA, the free encyclopedia: "Pellegrino Artusi (pronounced [pelleˈɡriːno arˈtuːzi]; Forlimpopoli, near Forli August 4, 1820 Florence, March 30, 1911) is best known as the author of famous Italian cookbook "La scienza in cucina e l'arte di mangiare bene" (The Science of Cooking and the Art of Eating Well). The title is clearly of a positivist bent. Artusi worshiped progress and the scientific method, which he used in his book. He was also an admirer of the physiologist Paolo Mantegazza. His book, in fact, can be considered a "scientifically tested" manual: every recipe was the result of trials and experiments. Writing only two decades after the unification of Italy, Artusi was the first to include recipes from all the different regions of Italy in a single cookbook. He is often credited with establishing a truly national Italian cuisine for the first time...." N.B. The "Ricciarelli di Siena" shown in the photo of this entry was bought in pastry shop in Siena, Italy by Laura Ferri as a gift for Mary Melfi. It seems that in present-day Italy the cookies are not presented on wafers, but are rolled in powdered sugar.

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