Tag: Bitter Almonds Recollections and Recipes from a Sicilian Girlhood

MARY TAYLOR SIMETI and her new book:SICILIAN SUMMER An adventure in cooking with my grandsons.

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Many of you would be familiar with the writings of Mary Taylor Simeti, one of the greatest authorities on Sicilian food.  You may have a copy of her classic, in-depth, definitive book of the culinary history, traditions and recipes of Sicily called Pomp and Sustenance: Twenty Five Centuries of Sicilian Food. This was published in several editions and the same text was later republished as Sicilian Food: Recipes from Italy’s Abundant Isle.

Or you may have read her other books about Sicily:  On Persephone’s lsland: A Sicilian Journal, Travels with a Medieval Queen or Bitter Almonds: Recollections and Recipes from a Sicilian Girlhood. She has also written other books published in Italian as well as travel and food articles for various American, Italian and British publications including the New York Times and the London Financial Times.

Her new book is called SICILIAN SUMMER: An Adventure in Cooking with My Grandsons.

This time Mary takes us to her farm at Bosco, located some 40 miles west of Palermo in the hills overlooking the Gulf of Castellammare. The farm has been in the Simeti family since 1933. Mary and her husband Tonino inherited it in 1966 and is now a diversified farm of less than forty acres of vineyards, olive groves, fruit and vegetables with organic certification for their Bosco Falconeria wine, olive oil and produce.

SICILIAN SUMMER: An Adventure in Cooking with My Grandsons, is an account and photographs of the food that Mary and her 4 grandsons (aged 13, 10, 7 and 5 years) cooked over 10 intensive, continuous days for the Simeti family – Mary and Tonino Simeti (the nonni), the four grandsons and the four children’s parents. The recipes that Mary and the boys prepare are all described and they use the abundant summer produce they themselves have helped to harvest from the fields: cucumbers, eggplants, tomatoes, almonds, zucchini blossoms and zucchini.

And when you have abundance, you use the same vegetable to produce various dishes – there are numerous ways to eat tomatoes and the zucchini blossom is enjoyed battered, stuffed and cooked in pasta dishes.

But it is so much more than a book of recipes suitable for her grandsons of various ages. Mary captures the pleasure that family brings when the three generations of the Simeti family gather on the farm each summer and she meditates on the role food can play within the family in bonding, consolidating tradition and identity and creating memories of her own childhood and those of her children. In between memories and recollections there is a beguiling mix of a family history and an account of the development of the farm that Mary and Tonino now share with their daughter, her husband and  two grandsons.

Mary’s honesty shines through the book. She questions her skill and ability to conduct these cooking experiences and is concerned about using safe implements for her young cooks. I loved the description of the very special garlic press:

 A little boat of burnished steel, it has holes in its hull through which tiny pieces of garlic rise up as you press it into the peeled cloves rocking back and forth on a cutting board.

And I loved the description of Tonino.  Grandson Matteo when young, would only see his grandfather once a year when he visited with his parents and brother from New York. Matteo was finding it difficult to relate to Tonino as he was unaccustomed and unfamiliar to him. But Mary describes how this all changed when the young Matteo … saw his grandfather drive up to the farmhouse on a tractor, a vision that in his mind would have outshone Apollo driving up in the chariot of the sun. Familiar or not, Tonino had achieved godhood.

Mary reflects on the current plight of the world that her grandsons are growing up in and wonders about the cooking project she has undertaken with them: Am I compiling an album of childhood memories, scenes that will have some relevance to their adult lives, or will this be the record – even for them – of a lost and irretrievable Golden age? 

She hopes that these experiences in her kitchen will make these moments more significant and render their memories more indelible.

The book ends with the preparation of the last meal for Tonino’s 79th birthday celebration.

Scattered as we soon would be, the shared memory of the past ten days, the cooking and the laughing and eating together would link us firmly together. I have never felt closer to my grandchildren, more sure than our sense of family.

Could this be the last summer that the Simeti family spends together?

Sicilian Summer: An Adventure in Cooking with my Grandsons. The publication date is 25 September, but it is already available for pre-ordering on line, either in paperback form or as an ebook (search for them on line). Obviously, if you would rather support your local bookshop and help promote Mary’s writing by doing so, you could ask your favourite bookshop to order it.

Mary Taylor Simeti is one of my heroes – I think that sometimes it takes a newcomer with a passion to observe and describe and rediscover what is Sicily and tease out the history behind the food (not that she is a newcomer any longer, she is part of Sicily, an expatriate who has spent all her adult life dedicated to her new homeland and appreciating its culture).

Marisa Raniolo Wilkins

Product details

  • Format Paperback | 138 pages
  • Dimensions 140 x 216 x 9mm | 231.33g
  • Publication date 25 Sep 2017
  • Publisher SilverWood Books Ltd
  • Publication City/Country Bristol, United Kingdom
  • Language English
  • Illustrations note colour photographs
  • ISBN10 1781326878
  • ISBN13 9781781326879

 

 

SICILIAN CASSATA and MARZIPAN AT EASTER (Food and Culture in Sicily, La Trobe University)

Cassata Siciliana and marzipan (pasta reale) are among the most iconic Easter desserts of Sicily, closely tied to the island’s history, religious traditions and enduring love of elaborate sweets, and at the Food and Culture in Sicily Easter cookery workshop held by La Trobe University, I demonstrated the preparation and explained the layered history of these two classics of the Sicilian pastry tradition.

The workshop took place on 23 March 2013 as part of a broader program exploring Sicilian food, culture and history. Many participants were encountering cassata and traditional Sicilian marzipan for the first time and were pleasantly surprised by the delicate almond flavour and the richness of these historic desserts.

Food, Culture and the Mediterranean World

The session began with a lecture on the History of food and feasting in Sicily, Italy and the wider Mediterranean.

This was presented by Dr Gillian Shepherd, Lecturer in Ancient Mediterranean Studies and Director of the A.D. Trendall Research Centre for Ancient Mediterranean Studies at La Trobe University. Her talk explored literary and archaeological evidence for food production and consumption in the ancient world.

Following the lecture, I conducted a food workshop and cooking demonstration illustrating how the many cultures that ruled Sicily shaped its cuisine over centuries — including the Greek, Roman, Arab, French and Spanish influences that continue to define Sicilian cooking today.

Part of the demonstration to show how Cassata is made.

Cassata Siciliana reflects Sicily’s layered culinary history. The ingredients of ricotta, almonds, sugar, sponge cake and marzipan reveal centuries of influence, from Arab agriculture and Spanish baking to the refined pastry techniques of the French-trained monsù chefs who shaped the cassata we know today. Cassata was an ideal dessert to demonstrate this context. Its origins reflect Sicily’s layered cultural history and it has long been associated with Easter celebrations.

Although traditionally linked to Easter, cassata has also become popular at Christmas and other festive occasions.

Cassata, sliced, shows filling and marzipan layer.

Cassata and the Cultural Layers of Sicily

Cassata is often described as one of Sicily’s most iconic desserts, but it is more than a cake. It reflects Sicily’s long history as a crossroads of Mediterranean cultures, where different peoples — Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Spaniards, French and others — left their marks on the island’s cuisine.

Ancient Roots: Ricotta and the Name Cassata

Some historians trace the name cassata to the Latin caseus, meaning cheese. This connection is plausible given that ricotta, a fresh sheep’s milk cheese, forms the heart of the dessert. In Sicilian dialect the word for cheese is casu, and earlier forms such as caseata may have existed, suggesting a long-standing association between the name and the ricotta filling.

The Arab Legacy: Sugar, Almonds and Citrus

However, the most significant early influence is widely believed to be Arab. The Arabs occupied Sicily for several centuries, beginning with their invasion in 827 AD and consolidating control by 902 AD. During their rule they transformed Sicilian agriculture and introduced crops and ingredients that profoundly shaped the island’s sweets — sugar cane, almonds, citrus fruits and pistachios. They also brought a taste for desserts enriched with nuts, dried fruits and fragrant syrups.

Even the name cassata may have Arabic roots. Some scholars suggest it derives from the Arabic word qas’ah, meaning a deep bowl or basin, possibly the type of container in which early versions of the cake were shaped.

Spanish Influence: The Arrival ofPan di Spagna

Later layers were added during the long period of Spanish rule, which extended across several centuries — through the Angevins, Aragonese, Spanish viceroys and Bourbons — from the late 13th century until the mid-19th century. The sponge cake used in cassata is thought to date from this era. In Italian it is called pan di Spagna (“bread of Spain”), suggesting its Iberian connection.

The Monsù: French Refinement in Sicilian Kitchens

Another important influence came from the French-trained chefs known in Sicily as monsù. From the 18th century onwards, aristocratic households in Sicily employed these highly skilled cooks, whose name derived from the French monsieur. The monsù refined and elaborated many traditional dishes, including elaborate pastries and decorated desserts. Their techniques helped shape the more ornate cassata we recognise today, with carefully layered sponge, ricotta filling, candied fruits and the decorative covering of green marzipan (pasta reale).

Convent Traditions: Nuns and the Art of Sicilian Sweets

The refinement of these sweets also owes much to the nuns of Sicilian convents, who played an important role in preserving and elaborating the island’s pastry traditions. Within convent kitchens, sweets made with ricotta, sugar and almonds were carefully prepared for religious feasts, especially Easter. Over time, these cloistered communities perfected decorative techniques using marzipan (pasta reale) and candied fruits, contributing to the elaborate appearance and symbolic richness that cassata and other Sicilian festive desserts display today.

Like Sicily itself, cassata is not the creation of a single culture, but a dessert shaped by many hands over time.

**The photos of the mosaics are from Piazza Armerina that i visited in one of my many trips to Sicily. the mosaics are extensive in the renowned Villa Romana Del Casale, built in the mid-4th century ad as a hunting lodge. the villa boasts some of the best-preserved and extensive examples of Roman mosaics, covering approximately 3,500 square metres.

HOW Marzipan is made

Almonds and Marzipan in Sicily

Sicily produces large quantities of almonds, and almond meal is used extensively in traditional sweets and pastries.

The island is especially famous for marzipan fruit, colourful almond confections shaped to resemble fruits and vegetables. Sicilian pastry cooks have long been highly regarded throughout Italy for their skill in making these elaborate sweets.

Marzipan is also known as pasta reale, meaning “royal paste”.

Marzipan when made in the traditional method is made by cooking a strong syrup of sugar and water and then adding freshly ground almonds. The mixture is kneaded till smooth (like bread dough) and then shaped.

This is the original, traditional recipe for making Marzipan:

Over the years I have been making marzipan and adapting a recipe from Bitter Almonds, Recollections and Recipes from a Sicilian girlhood.

Maria Grammatico has a very famous pastry shop in Erice in Sicily and her recipes have been recorded by Mary Taylor Simeti.

Ingredients
2 cups (300 g) whole blanched almonds
2 cups (400 g) granulated sugar *
1/3 cup water
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract (optional)
Method
In a food processor, grind the almonds with about 2 tablespoons of the sugar until very fine, almost powdery.
In a food processor or in an electric mixer, combine the nuts, the rest of the sugar, the water, vanilla, and the almond extract.
Process or mix until the paste is very smooth. Remove to a marble slab or other cold work surface dusted with confectioners’ sugar and knead briefly by hand.
Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to use. Marzipan will keep almost indefinitely in the refrigerator.
A VERY EASY WAY TO MAKE MARZIPAN

Ingredients

  • 2 cups ground almonds
  • 1½ cups pure icing sugar
  • ½ cup caster sugar
  • water as needed

I like the combination of icing sugar and caster sugar, as the caster sugar adds a slight crunch that complements the ground almonds.

When using fresh almonds, I prefer their natural flavour and usually omit vanilla, almond extract or Amaretto.

Method

I mix the sugars and almond meal with my fingers and gradually add water.

It is important to add the water slowly, because a mixture that is too wet will require more almonds and sugar to correct.

I knead the mixture much like bread dough, adding a little more water if necessary until the marzipan becomes smooth and pliable.

This is a simple decoration of one of the many Cassate I have made, which shows the marzipan coating.

Cassata on This Blog

This is not the first time I have written about cassata, marzipan or Easter desserts on this blog. There are several other posts exploring these themes and their place in Sicilian food traditions.

This post provides the recipe for making cassata.

 

LEMON MARMALADE TO USE IN SICILIAN PASTRIES. Conserva/ Marmellata di Limone (o di Cedro).

Lemon marmalade for Sicilian pastries is an essential ingredient in many traditional sweets. This lemon marmalade—known in Sicily as conserva or marmellata di limone (or made with cedro) adds the intense, aromatic citrus flavour typical of the island’s baking.

Sicily produces an impressive variety of citrus fruit, including the thick-skinned cedro (citron).

Cedri in Syracuse Market

Cedri, which resemble very large lemons, are eaten fresh in salads, but are most prized for being candied and used in cassate. Cedri are also  transformed into sweet conserve  and used in almond pastries and other desserts.

Candied/ glacé cedri

Sicilian pastries are often partly filled with lemon marmalade – Conserva or Marmellata di Limone o di Cedro (Citron).

In this blog post I have provided a recipe for making lemon Marmalade and one for Bocconotti, –  small tarts with lemon marmalade.

Recently I have fallen in love again with the pastries from Dolcetti (223 Victoria St, West Melbourne) made by Marianna Di Bartolo.

These exquisite dolcetti rekindled my desire for that strong, distinctive citrus taste found in so many Sicilian sweets.

MY RESEARCH and Sicilian Recipe Books

Researching the recipe was a process in itself. I rarely follow a single recipe strictly and usually compare multiple sources, drawing on what I know from years of reading Italian and Sicilian cookbooks. Each of the numerous times I have visited Sicily (and Italy), I have bought cookery books – not only by the greats of Sicilian cuisine and highly recognized writers and publications (Coria, Correnti, Taylor Simeti, Tasca Lanza (and more) but also by the less known ones (Maria Consoli Sardo, Di Leo, D’Alba, and many more.

The variations in recipes for this preserve, including quantities and methods, were numerous across different publications. Some directed peeling the fruit first, others boiled the peel multiple times and discarded the water, while some added sugar after boiling the pulp. The number of variations for making marmalade was comparable to those found in older Australian publications.

Among the many variations, the recipes I found most compelling were Marmellata di Limone (Maria Grammatico & Mary Taylor Simeti) and Conserva di Citru (Giuseppe Coria).

Grammatico/Taylor Simeti soak pricked lemons in water for five days, changing the water daily. Coria soaks un-pricked lemons for 24 hours and includes a cinnamon stick—something I also noticed in several older Sicilian texts.

Grammatico and Taylor Simeti recommended weighing the pulp and using 1¼ times its weight in sugar.

Coria suggested adding 2 kg of sugar for every 3 kg of pulp and 1 cup of water. I particularly liked his recipe for the addition of a cinnamon stick, which was also mentioned in many of my older Italian publications.

What I did, RECIPE

Inspired, I decided to make a homemade conserva using large, thick-pith lemons—each weighing around 700g—treating them much like cedri.

Pricked the lemons (weight 2.1kg ) and soaked them for 3 days, changing the water every day to soften the skins.

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Sliced them into medium julienne with a mandoline for texture.

Used 1 kg sugar to 2 kg pulp, added 3 cinnamon sticks, and no water.

Cooked until set (about 40 minutes), using the traditional saucer test – You know the old trick about testing jam/ marmalade by placing a little on a cold saucer, cooling it, and if adequately set it should wrinkle and feel firm.

Packed the hot conserve into sterilised jars.

Lemon and Cinnamon Marmalade

The result is an intensely flavoured, deeply lemony conserve—perfect for filling Sicilian pastries or adding bright citrus notes to desserts.

Cedro is used in Cassata and Panforte (not Sicilian).

PANFORTE again and again

PANETTONE AND PANFORTE for an ITALIAN CHRISTMAS

SICILIAN CASSATA and some background (perfect for an Australian Christmas)

SICILIAN CASSATA and MARZIPAN AT EASTER (Food and Culture in Sicily, La Trobe University)

CASSATA DECONSTRUCTED – a postmodernist take on Sicilian Cassata

 Recipe: BOCCONOTTI

Italian bocconotti are small, buttery pastries filled with jam. In Sicily they are filled with citron (cedro) marmalade.

The tarts can be left open-faced or covered with slightly smaller pastry circles to create small lids, placed in the centre, but leaving a gap and not reaching the edges.

Ingredients
  • 500 g plain flour
  • 250 g sugar
  • 150 g unsalted butter (traditional is lard for pastries)
  • 2 eggs + 1 yolk
  • Finely grated zest of 1 lemon
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract or seeds of ½ vanilla bean
  • 2–3 tbsp white wine (dry)
  • 400 g marmellata – use the lemon marmalade
  • Method
Make the pastry (pasta frolla)
  • In a large bowl, mix the flour and sugar.
  • Rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Don’t overwork the pastry.
  • Add the eggs, yolk, lemon zest, vanilla, and 2 tablespoons of white wine.
  • Work the dough quickly until it comes together—add the extra tablespoon of wine only if needed.
  • Shape into a ball, flatten slightly, wrap, and refrigerate for 1 hour.
  • Use small tartlet tins or mini-muffin tins. Grease lightly with butter.
  • Roll the pastry to about 3–4 mm thickness. Cut circles large enough to line the moulds.
  • Press the dough gently into each mould. and fill generously with the marmalade but leave some space at the top
  • Preheat the oven to 180°C (fan 170°C). Bake for 20–25 minutes, until pale golden.
  • Cool in the tins for 10 minutes, then transfer to a rack.