BAKE!

Neapolitan Easter Pie

I haven't been here for a while due to computer woes (all settled now) and edits on BREAD! due out in the fall.  Things are finally starting to lighten up.  Watch for complete instructions on cultivating your own sourdough starter beginning Tuesday.

Photo credit:  Charles Schiller

PASTIERA NAPOLETANA

NEAPOLITAN EASTER PIE WITH RICOTTA AND WHEAT

Though the official name of this pie is Pastiera Napoletana, many Italian Americans also refer to it as Pizza di Grano, grain or wheat pie.  It’s a sweet crust filled with ricotta, pastry cream, and cooked wheat berries, and scented with orange flower water.  Please be careful when you purchase the wheat.  If you live near an Italian grocery store, they will always have it around Easter – you just need to ask for wheat or grain.  Or you can buy it even more easily in a health food store.  The wheat berries you need to buy are white, not brown or red.  White wheat berries cook relatively quickly whereas the unhulled darker ones take forever to cook.  If no wheat berries are available, substitute an equal amount of long-grain rice (boil it like pasta until tender, about 15 minutes) or pearl barley, which is cooked exactly like the wheat berries.

Blueberries, anyone?

What is it about blueberries that I find so addictive?  For me every summer is a continuous parade of blueberries into my kitchen and back out as pies, tarts, muffins, scones, jam, and just about anything else I can cram them into.  Maybe it’s my New Jersey roots – the modern blueberry was born in Hammonton, New Jersey just about 100 years ago – or maybe I’m just hopelessly addicted.  And I’m excited about just getting an assignment from Saveur magazine to write about blueberries, New Jersey, and of course, recipes that use them.  It won’t appear until next year when the official 100th anniversary of cultivated blueberries takes place, but I’ll be celebrating with plenty of blueberries before, during, and after that.

 
Summer is chugging away toward its inevitable close and last Sunday was one of those summer-is-ending milestones – this year’s last session of Summer Fruit Pies and Tarts at ICE.  We had an enthusiastic and friendly group as you can see from the photo – they’re holding the deep dish blueberry pie they had just made.

The pie is easy, delicious, and quick to prepare.  Like a classic British pie it only has a top crust; it’s like a thin baking powder biscuit and the filling is mercifully free of thickeners.  It’s a little soupy, but the juicy filling and tender crust are a perfect match; they send a clear message that they’d like a big spoonful of whipped cream to join them.  Try this now that blueberry availability is high and prices are low. 

Department of Correction

If you're wondering what to do with the hazelnuts in the Chocolate Hazelnut Tart recipe on page 18 of BAKE! you are not alone.  Somehow the essential instruction was omitted from the printed book, but it's an easy fix.  At the end of step 4 in the recipe, the missing text should read, "Stir in the hazelnuts."  If only every mistake were as easy to correct...