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Pies and Tarts
Neapolitan Pastiera ricotta pie
La Pastiera (Neapolitan ricotta Easter pie using cooked barely, eggs, sugar, pistachios and orange zest)
Originated from: Naples, Campania, Italy
Occasion: Easter and other times
Contributed by: Taken from "Cucina Teorico-pratica" by Ippolito Cavalcanti (1839).

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Ingredients

For pastry crust
Common pastry dough

For filling
barely ["grano"], cooked
ricotta, drained
fine sugar
pistachios, shelled
salt
eggs
cinnamon
a touch of water
orange zest


Original using text in Neapolitan dialect
a pasta ordinaria dinto a na tiella sodonita di nzogna

miezo ruotolo de grano buono
recotta bona senza siero
zuccaro fino
pistato
pocorillo de sale
dozzana d'ova
onza de cannella fina
tantillo d'acqua
scorte di sciuruppate





Directions

Prepare barely, using a mortar crush the grain, then boil it until it is ready for use.

Make the filling using cooked barley, eggs and ricotta, flavor it with pistachios, cinnamon and orange zest.

Make the pastry dough.

Line a greased pie pan with rolled out pastry dough.

Pour the filling into the pie pan.

Cut pastry strips, and make lattice pattern on top of mixture.

Bake.

Cool, and then serve.



Original text using Neapolitan dialect

Piglia miezo ruotolo de grano buono, e sciveto aceno aceno, se nfonne, e po lo pise dinto a lo mortaro, mpero senza farlo rompere ma co lo pesaturo arravogliannolo sempe pe dint o lo siesso mortaro pe farne luva chella vrenna, ncioe, che lla scorzetella che tene; doppo lo miette a bollere per 24 ore, e quanno se cuotto lo farraje buono arrefredda, e po piglia uo ruotolo de recotta bona senza siero, la mimische co le grano, dannoce nauta pesatella dint a lo mortaro, doppo nce miette doje rotala de zuccaro fino, e pistato, no pocorillo de sale, nce sbatte na dozzana d'ova, e n'onza de cannella fina, e no tantillo d'acqua, e quanno s'e buono rammalllato, nce miette tutte scorte di sciuruppate; farraje la pasta ordinaria dinto a na tiella sodonita di nzogna, e cce miette la paparotta de la pastiera facennoce ncoppa na gratigia de pasta purzi, e la farraje cocere a lo furno.

Vi ca chesta e la pastiera la chiu accellete che nce pozza essere.


Notes

The recipe in this entry was taken from the book, "Cucina Teorico-pratica" by Ippolito Cavalcanti (Naples: Di G. Palma, 1839). For the complete copyright-free Italian cookbook visit www.archive.org.... P.S. If the directions for this recipe weren't in dialect, they would be relatively easy to understand, but as they are written in dialect, it was difficult for me to get the nuances. Still, the fact that this recipe for "Pastiera" is flavored with pistachios rather than almonds (What North Americans have become accustomed to for this style of ricotta pie) is quite interesting. From going through Cavalcanti's cookbook it seems that in the 19th century pistachios were as commonly used in Southern Italian sweets as were almonds and hazelnuts. It's hard to say why North Americans ended up favoring almonds and hazelnuts over pistachios -- perhaps cost was a factor, or perhaps Northern-style sweets which make abundant use of almonds (rather than pistachios) became the norm. Personally, I prefer roasted almonds (to pistachios) in biscotti, but in ricotta pies roasted almonds don't add much flavor; pistachios are a better choice. Comments and photo: Mary Melfi.

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