Category Archives: baking

Pastizzi – Camenzuli Style

February 10, 2013 Georgina 61 Comments

Pastizzi ta’ l-Irkotta or Pastizzi tal-Pizelli! Those are only two of the most popular fillings you will find because nowadays you may find many more types of fillings…from sweet to savoury but I still think that the original are the best! Pastizzi get a bad rap because the dough contains a little more than your average fat. Usually a basic dough has half the amount of fat as flour. The pastizzi dough has slightly more but is oh sooo worth it.

It is also slightly more work. Well, when I say slightly, I mean a lot! And also slightly messier…ok a lot messier…but I don’t want to scare you away and really want you to try it, cause when you make it and taste it, you’re going to fall in love. There’s just nothing like that rich, crunchy but melt in your mouth pastry!! And this recipe delivers! Pastizzi are also great to freeze so you can always have some on hand. Then just pop two in the toaster oven and have them for your lazy Sunday morning breakfast!

This recipe is one of those that has been passed down to me by my relatives who had emigrated to the US in the early 60’s which means they’d been here for 30 years before I made my appearance and had all that time to finesse everything Maltese!! I have a big family here and rest assured that there’s pastizzi at every gathering and not surprising at all, it would be the pastizzi that would be the first to disappear.

Pastizzi call for a mixture of butter and lard OR crisco. There was a time when just the word LARD would make me cringe and seeing anyone using it in cooking would immediately make me lose my appetite. But here is an article I read recently that made me think differently.

Dough

1lb all purpose flour
1/4 cup oil
pinch of salt
9oz water
9oz lard or crisco
3oz butter

Make the dough by putting the dry ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer. Add the oil and water and let it knead for about 12 mins until you have a nice smooth dough. Let it rest for about half an hour. Cut the dough in half. Open one of the halves into a long strip as shown in the photo beneath.

Take both fats and mix them together. Divide in two. Take one part of the mixed fat and slather it all over the rolled out dough.

From the end closest to you, start stretching and rolling while widening the dough as shown. Keep doing this until you reach the other end. You’ll end up with a long rope like piece of dough.

Take one end and roll it into a spiral shape. Put some fat over the top, cover and store in the fridge until ready to use. Do the same with the other piece of dough and remaining fat.

Filling
Make the pastizzi filling by mixing 1lb ricotta, 2 eggs and pinch of salt together.

Forming Pastizzi
Take the end of the spiral shaped dough and cut about two inches off the end. Flatten it with your hand as you turn it round and round between your fingers so you can see the ridges of the dough forming. Form it into a circle about 3-4 inches in diameter. Put a dollop of ricotta in the middle.

Fold over and seal and place on a greased dish or on a silpat. Do this until you’ve used up all the dough and ricotta.

You can freeze them at this point. Or you can bake them in a 375 degree oven for about 20-30 mins until golden brown.

As with everything, moderation is the key. Pastizzi are not the the healthiest of foods, but then neither are croissants or eclairs and it would be a shame if we couldn’t have them once in a while, so go on…have one…you know you want to.

baking, cheese, Malta Links

Ricotta Qassatat

February 3, 2013 Georgina 45 Comments

Two very popular snacks in Malta are Qassatat and Pastizzi. You can call them cousins with pastizzi being the posher or richer of the two. I find qassatat are the easier ones to make so we’ll be tackling that one first and then later on, we’ll try our hand at making pastizzi.

There’s all sort of different fillings you can use for the qassatat and ricotta ones seem to be the most favoured. You can add raisins or sauteed onions or fresh fava beans with the ricotta. These types of fillings are sought after during Lent when it’s customary to fast.

Other types of fillings include meat and anchovies, but really, you can make as many types of filling as your creativity and taste will take you.

So this is your basic Ricotta Qassatat Recipe

Dough

1 lb all purpose flour
8 oz chilled butter cut up in cubes
1 egg (optional)
pinch of salt
about 1/2 cup water

Start by putting the flour and butter and salt in your stand mixer and work it until it looks like breadcrumbs.
Add the egg and water and knead until it comes together.
Take it out and knead it into a ball and let it rest at room temperature for about half an hour.

Filling

1lb ricotta
2 eggs
pinch of salt
1/2 cup grated pecorino romano cheese (optional)

Some ricotta is more creamy than others and you might only need one egg…so use your judgement. The filling should not be too liquidy or it would ooze out of the dough.

Put all the ingredients together and stir vigorously.

Qassatat

Roll half the dough into two long ropes about two inches thick and cut it up into two inch chunks.

Take one piece and open it up into a circle about 3-4 inch diameter depending on how big you like them.

Put a dollop of the ricotta mixture in the middle.

Take the outside of the dough and start pleating while turning the dough about an inch each time until you get to the first pleat.

Continue this until you’ve used up the dough and ricotta.

Brush on a bit of egg wash.

Bake at 400 degree oven for about half an hour depending on your oven until they’re golden brown

baking

Hobz or Ftira biz-zejt u l-Kunserva

January 22, 2013 Georgina 5 Comments

Now that we’ve mastered the Maltese Bread and Ftira, we can work on the filling!! In Malta, our most favourite way to have the bread is with kunserva. Hobz biz zejt u l-kunserva…nothing like it. So that’s bread with tomato paste and olive oil.

Of course you can also go all gourmet and add anything that you like…maltese sausage, gbejniet, which is a type of maltese cheese, canned tuna fish, chopped up onion, cannelini beans, pickled veggies, capers, olives…the list is endless…make up your own combination of your favourite things. Parsley or Basil, some olive oil, salt and pepper and oh it’s just heaven on earth!

baking, Malta Links

Bonding over Bread (Maltese Bread or Ftira Recipe)

January 19, 2013 Georgina 135 Comments

I don’t think it would be appropriate to have a blog called Tal-Forn and not include the best bread recipe ever! Anyone who has ever tried it has given it 5 stars and I guarantee that if you try this, you won’t be disappointed and we’ll be bread friends for life!

In fact, this recipe has made me quite a few friends, from around the world. But first let me tell you a little bit about how it came to be.

When we came to live in the United States, back in 1994, there were quite a few things I missed, but nothing more than a good loaf of Maltese Bread! I tried the fancy bakeries and the not so fancy stores but nothing came close, so within a week of settling down, I got my first bread machine! It was and still is the most used gadget in my kitchen to date! I’m actually on my third one which is less than a month old and a gift from my lovely family in Malta…love you guys soo much!

So I’ve been making bread for years and years but I still had not come close to the taste and texture of the Maltese Ftira that everyone falls in love with on their first visit to the lovely Island of Malta. Every now and then, I’d do a search for nothing, but never gave up. Then along came fb and there it was…the recipe I’d been looking for all these years on Ilovefood.com. It was quite a detailed recipe from a Linda Speight from London!! The thing that captured my interest from the get go, was her first sentence, which went something like “This is much easier than it sounds…”. Plus she had written the recipe in so much detail that I thought there was no way I could fail! And so I set on another mission to see if this was the recipe of my dreams.

Being an avid baker, I had all the ingredients on hand and started making the starter, which I’d always found intimidating. And the rest is history. The best part though, is that Linda and I are best of friends. We bonded over bread and we now chat all the time, sharing recipes and talk about food and weather and everything in between!!

Ok…so if you googled Maltese Bread or Ftira and Google brought you to my blog, you must be eager to get started and make this delicious bread in your own kitchen. I have tried making this recipe with AND without a bread machine and I have to admit that this ONLY works with a bread machine.

Recipe…

You have to have a starter….if you don’t, don’t worry, it’s really easy to make your own…

All you need is a clean jar and some flour and water.

Put a tablespoon each of water and flour in a clean jar and stir with a plastic spoon or chopstick which is what I use and cover. They say metal is not good…not sure why and I don’t ask questions. Store in a warm place away from direct sunlight.

Do this every day…each morning, add another tablespoon of water and a tablespoon of flour, and stir and cover…for seven days…and on the eighth day, you’re ready to start on your first loaf/rolls/ftira/pizza/focaccia…oh so many things you can make!!

In the bread machine pan, put

slightly less than 1.5 cups water or, in this case, whey

3 cups strong hi gluten flour (very very important you use strong flour with at least 11gr of protein)

Ingredients

120gr starter
300gr cups water
(together the starter and water should weigh 420gr)

420gr-450g high gluten flour (depending where you live)
2 tsp sugar
2 tsp salt

2 tblsp olive oil
1 1/2 tsp yeast

Put everything in the bread machine on the dough cycle. When it’s done, take out the dough and let it rest for about five minutes. Divide in 3 equal parts. Take each part and flatten it a bit to about 8-10 inch rounds. Tear a hole in the middle. Cover and let it rest until double in size for about half an hour but it really all depends on how warm your kitchen is. Bake at 425 for about 12-15 mins. Again, it depends on your oven, so keep an eye on it.

Now that you made this, don’t forget to feed your starter every day. Just add equal amounts of water and flour and this can go on for years! If you need to go on holiday or just need a break from making bread, just store the starter in the fridge. When you’re ready to use again, take it out, feed it and use it at room temperature.

Hope you enjoyed this post and if you make this bread, I’ll be very happy to hear how it turned out for you or answer any questions. Here’s to bread!!