Torta di Castagne

Chestnuts are in season! Actually, you can make this chestnut cake anytime, as I used frozen chestnuts and I doubt anyone would be able to tell the difference. They are much easier to use as they come already peeled. But, regardeless of the availability of chestnuts, only in autumn can one truly enjoy this cake. It's a traditional pastry from the Italian region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia, at least according to the book we got the recipe from: Le Ricette Regionali Italiane, which we mentioned in this post. Try it, it's got a very delicate flavour, very elegant, and it looks like that as well:



The ingredients are:

• 400 g of frozen, peeled chestnuts, boiled in water with a bit of salt and passed through a food mill
  
• 100 g of almonds ground in a food processor to a coarse flour
• 200 g of sugar
• 100 g of unsalted butter at room temperature
  
• 4 eggs
• 1 lemon
• 1tbs of flour

Beat the egg yolks with the sugar until creamy. Add the butter and the zest of the lemon. Blend well. Next, fold in the chestnut puree and the almond flour. Beat the eggwhites to a peak and fold into the chestnut mixture. Butter a pie dish, mine was 25 cm in diameter and about 4 cm deep, flour it, and add the mixture. Bake in the middle rack of an 180C oven for about 35 minutes.

Sourdough Variations

I can't stop baking bread using the no-knead technique and sourdough as the leavening agent. The basic recipe is described here, but I've already tried a few variations. The last one was quite sucessful: instead of 4 ounces of whole wheat flour, add 2 ounces of whole rye flour and 2 ounces of rolled oats. Add also a tablespoon of rosemary, and instead of using cornmeal to prevent the dough from sticking to the tea towel during the last proofing stage, I use rolled oats also. It's funny how the rolled oats disappear during the fermentation process, as you cannot see them in the finished loaf. I regret the lack of pictures, and a way of communicating the lovely rosemary smell that baking one of these breads produces...

Edit: Another variation and pictures. Add 1 cup of raisins instead of the one tablespoon of rosemary. Outstanding is the word:




Edit: Or add 3 1/2 tsp of quinoa, 3 1/2 tsp of millet and the same amount of flax seeds. Use flax seeds to prevent the dough from sticking to the tea towel.

Aubergine Lasagna

For me, there are always two (related) issues to consider when baking lasagna: how much sauce to make, and how large a baking dish to use. That's why, when preparing this one, I took careful notes of all the process. This recipe serves 4 people, with plenty of leftovers. Here it goes.

For the tomato sauce:

• four 800g (net weight) tins of whole tomatoes, packed in juice
  
• 2 large onions, diced
  
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 dried thai chillies, minced
  
• 2 bay leaves
• salt and olive oil

This takes awhile to cook, and can be prepared in advance, so start early. In a large pot, heat some olive oil. When it's hot, add the bay leafs, garlic and chillies. When the garilc is golden, add the onions and fry slowly until golden. Then, start addind the tomatoes and the packing juice. Add the tomatoes one by one, crushing them with your hands and making sure you discard any hard bits. Bring the sauce to a boil, add some salt and perhaps a bit more olive oil. Bring the heat to its lowest setting and let the sauce simmer for as long as you can. Say, an hour. Stir the sauce frequently to prevent burning.


The aubergine:

Get 2 kilos of aubergine - perhaps 5 medium ones - wash them, dry them, and cut the tops. Slice them lenghtwise into 1cm thick slices. Frying them is a mess. They soak a lot of oil and then you need to let them drain overnight. And the resulting lasagna is always too oily. Here's a better solution: arrange the aubergine slices on a silicone mat and drizzle a bit of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper. Put the silicone mat in a 180C oven, middle rack, heat from top and bottom, fan on. Once the upper side begins to gain some colour, turn the slices, season with salt and pepper, and drizzle a bit more olive oil. When they are soft and cooked through, move them to a bowl that you then cover with a plate so that the aubergine sweats and softens a bit more. You will have to do this in several batches as the slices cannot overlap.

Assembling the lasagna and baking it.

You will need

• 500g of lasagna sheets - the pre-cooked kind works really well
• 2 mozzarella balls, thinly sliced
  
• 2 cups of grated parmesan, the best quality you can afford
• one 13x9x2 inch Pyrex baking dish

Start by spreading a thin layer of sauce on the baking dish. Then, a layer of lasagna sheets, making sure they overlap a bit. More sauce, a layer of aubergine slices, followed by the mozzarella. Sauce, lasagna sheets, sauce, more aubergine, sauce, lasagna sheets and finish with a layer of sauce. Sprinkle the parmesan on top and on to the middle rack of the oven it goes. Set it at 180C, firstly with the heat coming only from below, and then after 20 minutes or so switch to top and bottom heat. The lasagna should be ready in 30-35 minutes. Let it rest for 15 minutes or so before serving: it's really hot and the flavours need to meld.

The mozzarella is clearly optional. You may or may not enjoy its presence. You can also sprinkle parmigiano between some of the layers, but for that you need quite a bit more cheese.