Whilst attending a Southern Italian cooking class at Carrick, I was introduced to a mussel recipe of Southern Italian origin by Antonio Ruggerino, chef and owner of Verde Restaurant+Bar.

The recipe is so quick & effortless to prepare, and yet, tasted so nice that it almost beggars belief.

This is a great recipe for quick entree, or if you want something a little fancy during the week when there isn’t a lot of time for cooking available.

Before we get to that though, imagine if you will the following scenario.

[Begin Scenario]

You arrive home from work, wound up with pent up stress from the day’s stupidities. You feel you deserve something nice but you can’t be bothered spending a lot of time in the kitchen.

Perhaps you happen to have a dozen or so fresh mussels left over from the weekend, or have picked some up on the way home.

You gather a few ingredients together. Nothing fancy.

Half a tomato and a slice off the side of a lemon, both of which are diced roughly. Grab a sprig of parsley, breaking it down into shorter lengths, stalks and all. Mince up a clove of garlic. All of that gets thrown into a small pot.

Pour a glass of white wine for yourself. Since you feel the need to indulge a little to help unwind, you select a decent white from the stash. Pour a glass for yourself and add a splash into the pot for good measure.

Follow up with a dose of your best extra virgin olive oil and a few grinds of black pepper.

Your hand goes into the pot, squeezing every last drop of juice and essential oils out of the ingredients to form a stock. Between the wine and the pulverisation of the ingredients, the pent up stress starts to surface.

With the stock done, you grab the mussels and head to the sink. Hands are rinsed of oils and juices. With a clean set of pliers, you set your sites on the mussels.

The beards are wrenched away with some force; the shells are scrubbed vigorously under running water, all the while muttering curses.

Stupid… Son of a… Mother…

You may even project the annoyances of your day onto the mussels. Imagining that you’re using the pliers to tear off the annoying bum fluff that arrogant bastard thinks is fashionable, or scrubbing the cold sore crusted sneer off the face of that rude tramp. Get some cream!

The mussels, once cleaned, are unceremoniously dumped into the pot, lid on, and the heat set to hell-raiser high.

With a bout of therapeutic aggression over with, you ease into a relaxed state. Wine is slowly slipped as the mussels steam away; their lips gape open in a silent cry for help. A futile effort, as all that awaits them is their pending demise deliciousness.

A quick, simple salad is tossed together, and a few slices of bread are gathered as you wait.

After about a couple of minutes, the mussels are done. The stock’s volume has increased with the briny fluids of the mussels, contributing their wonderful flavour.

Total prep and cooking time: approx. 10 minutes.

You could go through the effort of plating up the mussels, but really, why bother? It’ll just create extra dishes to wash and there isn’t anyone around that you need to impress.

Mussels straight from the pot. Salad out of the mixing bowl. Bread for soaking up the juice. Perhaps a top up of the wine. Otherwise, you’re pretty much done.

There’s no real need to reach for any utensils. The mussel shells take care of that themselves. Perfect for scraping away the mussel meat, and scooping up the light, fragrant broth.

Ok, maybe a fork for the salad. Sure, there’s no one to impress but that doesn’t mean you should do away with all manners.

Sooner than you could have thought possible, you sitting down to wonderful light, healthy dinner with the stresses of the day all but melted away.

There isn’t even the looming stress of the post dinner clean up. If you played your cards right, there won’t be all that much to wash up.

[End Scenario]

Ok, when it comes time to preparing this meal yourself, your specific circumstances may differ. However, hopefully this scenario illustrates how quick and easy this dish can be.

Several minutes prep, a couple of minutes cooking time and you’re done. You could conceivably spend less than 30 mins on the whole process. From prep, to eating, to post-meal clean up.

With such a simple recipe, the potential for adding your own creative touches are nigh on endless.

Use a little butter instead of the oil, added right at the end monter au beurre, for some richness. Fry up some bacon in the pan at the beginning and omit the olive oil once more to add a smoky, meaty quality. Add some additional herbs such as dill; or lemongrass & coriander for an Asian touch.

Feeling hungry? No worries. You can easily double the amount of mussels without changing the amount of underlying ingredients. I found that the end result still tastes great!

Whichever way you decide to go with this dish, use the best, freshest ingredients you have. Especially with the wine.

It’s amazing how stark the difference is between a nice light white wine vs. say, a cheap bottle of supermarket sherry that may be the only thing lying around because you forgot to buy some white on the way home.

You know, just saying.

Hope you enjoy this recipe!

Mussels Calabrian (Serves 1)

Adapted from a recipe by Chef Antonio Riggerino from Verde Restaurant+Bar, a Southern Italian restaurant located in East Sydney.

Total time: approx. 10 minutes

Ingredients

• Mussels, approx. 12 for entree; 24 for main.
• 1/2 ripe tomato
• 2 Tbsp diced celery
• 1/4 medium lemon
• 1 sprig of parsley
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1-2 Tbsp white wine
• 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• Black pepper to taste

Method

1. Debeard mussels with fingers or clean set of pliers, and scrub down to remove any muck adhered to the shells. Place to one side.
   • Further reading on mussel preparation & storage.
2. Roughly dice up the tomatoes, celery & lemon. Break down the parsley, stalks and all, into short lengths. Mince the garlic.
3. Add all of the above ingredients into a small pot, along with approx. 1 Tbsp each of white wine and extra virgin olive oil, and pepper to taste.
   • Use the best tasting wine and olive oil you have available, as it will greatly impact the final result.
4. Roughly squeeze the ingredients with your hand in the pot to extract all the juices & essential oils.
   • There should be at least 3mm of liquid at the bottom of the pot as there needs to be enough liquid to steam the mussels. Add a little extra white wine, if necessary.
5. Place the cleaned mussels into the pot and cook on high with the lid on. Once the mussels open, cook for another 30 sec to 1 minute.
   • The cooking time for an entree sized portion is around 2 minutes.
6. Seasoning shouldn’t be required as the mussels are salt-water creatures. However, once mussels have finished cooking, season broth to taste if necessary.

Serve

Plate and serve with thick slices of bread to mop up all the flavourful broth. Alternately, serve straight out of the pot for a more rustic approach.

Broth can be strained, if necessary. The ingredients have given their all and would likely not be consumed, especially the lemon rinds!

Download this recipe – Mussels Calabrian (PDF)

Imagine, if you will, the following scenario.

It’s a wonderfully moderate Summer’s day with a nice, cool breeze. You make you way out to a park, perhaps to walk the dog. Before you, a large gathering of people (you estimate around fifty) are having what looks to be a picnic. Rugs laid out on the grass, as well as a generous spread various foods, both savory and sweet, which remains otherwise untouched. People sitting or standing around in small clusters socialising & seemingly enjoying each others company. The person whom you presume to be the host, gathers everyone’s attention in order to say a few words. A moment later, forty odd digital cameras, ranging from a basic camera phone, point & shoot compact cameras, through to pro level camera equipment worth thousands of dollars, suddenly appears from seemingly no where & proceeds to fire away. The focus of their photo frenzy is not aimed at the group as a whole. Not even an individual. The food is the epicenter of their attention, & continues to be that way for the next ten minutes or so.

I’d imagine it would be quite a surreal sight to bear for the person walking their dog in the park. Believe me, as one of the fifty odd attendees of the Sydney food blogger’s Christmas picnic in Hyde park, it was surreal even for me.

It takes a little something special to organise a food blogger gathering of fifty people. However, we are talking about Helen (Grab Your Fork) and Suze (chocolatesuze) after all. I doubt that anyone else from the Sydney food blogging community would have been able to pull those sorts of numbers.

When you have a gathering of food bloggers, invariably food will be involved.

Almost seems redundant to have to say it.

Anyhow, this poorly conceived segue brings us to my contributions to this picnic of all picnics. We were asked to bring an item of food along with us to the picnic. I chose to bring two. The first one is what I refer to as Korean fried chicken wings with a sweet & spicy chili sauce. I was expecting for this to disappear in moments. However, it seemed a general rule that day that if the food was likely to leave your hand sticky or otherwise soiled, it wasn’t as popular.

Either that or Billy’s savoury item of Korean roasted pork ssam set such a high bar that when other savouries were contemplated, it was like “Meh, not as good as Billy’s. I can do without”. I wouldn’t know, cause I totally missed out! :(

Anyhow, my second contribution were these mini cheese burgers. Initially, I’d not even intended to bring these along but I figured that there were some people who aren’t the best of friends with chili and may appreciate these as an alternative. These were more popular as only a single burger was left, which surprised me to no end.

For those of you who’d like to know how this was made, I’ll give a basic prep guide below. For those that don’t, please move on to the next image.

The mini cheese burgers are pretty straight forward. The prep guide is as follows:

• The burger patties starts off as 40% veal mince, 40% pork mince & 20% chunky paste of caramelised red onions (made the same way you would start making French onion soup, including brandy & seasoning). All ingredients should be at room temp.
• Incorporate together with a single egg and enough bread crumbs to bring together. Season to taste.
• Shape/fry burger patties as you see fit. In this case, it was done over a charcoal bbq to add a little extra smokiness.
• Once cooked on both sides, place a slice of cheese on top (Red Leicester in my case) and either place under the grill or, do as I did & use a blow torch to melt the cheese.
• Assemble mini burgers with a layer of tomato sauce on the bottom (Baxter’s tomato chutney in my case), burger patty, slice of dill pickle & finally more sauce.

One final note on the mini burgers, after making these, I’ve developed an appreciation for a pickle’s role within a burger. Not only does the flavour work well with the tomato chutney but the acidity of the pickle cuts through the fat of the burger patty and cheese.

Naturally, there was a little more food than just what I had to bring. Ok, a lot more food :)

Some of the ones worth noting for me were…

Suze (chocolatesuze) had contributed what I’d like to refer to as a platter of childhood memories. From top to bottom, fairy bread, honey joys & chocolate crackles.

Helen’s (Grab Your Fork) OMFG! Elvis cupcakes. Having had the pleasure to sample previous cupcakes of bacon & maple syrup & coca cola, there was much anticipation on how these would be. She didn’t disappoint. These cupcakes, containing bacon bits, a strawberry jam core, with salted peanut butter icing topped with more bacon, were her best yet.

Very few dishes were completely gone by the end of the picnic. Billy’s roast pork was one of them. Helen’s cupcakes, I believe, were the only other one.

Having missed out on Billy’s (A Table for Two) roast pork ssam, I at least had the pleasure of sampling his champagne jelly with longan fruit and flecks of gold foil. This was quite a nice dessert, though quite hard to eat under picnic conditions. Would love to try this again in more formal surrounds.

Had a slice of this cake which I believe was Rose’s (hmm… just click on the link, you’ll find out). This was a really nice cake. Would love to find out where it was purchased from.

Steph (raspberri cupcakes) brought these cute little festive biscuits with a candy cane fudge filling. If you’ve had any of Steph’s pastries, it’s pretty much same-same. In other words, fantastic! :)

Now, for a small collection of food I would have like to have tried but otherwise didn’t (damn you, socialising!)

Ellie (Almost Bourdain) brought along these duck in wanton cups. Being Ellie’s food, I bet these were delicious!

Rice noodle rolls from Chris and Tim (The Way it Crumbles). Would love to know where these were purchased as well :)

Gummi Baby, Lobo, Moya & Shanks (YaYa’s Yum Yums) contributed these lovely looking cupcakes, which were finished on site. Not the only group to bring cupcakes but I believe the only attendees to not go by their real names. Unless those are real names, which in that case, cool :)

Actually, there are a lot more than these that I missed out on, some of which I have photos for. For a larger set of food photos, check out the heart of food Facebook fan page. I’ll post the photos a little while after this post goes up so come back later if you don’t see them there. Otherwise, keep an eye out on my Twitter timeline, as a lame auto message pops up there when photos are uploaded to the fan page.

Food wasn’t the only thing on the agenda for this gathering of gastronomes (oddly enough). We were also requested to bring a gift of around $10 to contribute to a Kris Kringle game. Never understood the concept of Kris Kringle. Having seen it in action, though I get the appeal, it still seems somewhat alien to someone who generally puts as much effort as they can into finding a present the receiving party would appreciate, or not give at all. While some people had such bad luck with their present selection that it may have been better to have done without, others the sting of disappointment as the present they were sufficiently happy with was taken from them and replaced by one that was sub-par comparatively speaking, overall people seemed to enjoy themselves.

With the passing of Kris Kringle, people made their move and headed off into the sunset. A remaining few that stayed behind to clean up enjoyed a cup of Richard’s (Here Comes the Food) egg nog.

Cheers to a successful, and not to mention fun, food blogger gathering. Hope the Nuffnang Christmas party coming up this Thursday or the Australian food blogger’s conference planned for early next year will be just as big and just a fun! Otherwise, there’s always next year’s Christmas picnic :)

One final note. To the person who came up with this idea for the Kris Kringle that I received, you rock! Really appreciate this sort of humour. The chocolates are pretty good too :)

Edit: Ever experience a moment of irony (not the Alanis Morrisette kind; only thing ironic about that song was that it contained no irony) whereby you, say for example, take a group photo of fifty food bloggers at a Christmas picnic, process the images, have them distributed to all the attendees and then forget to include it into your own blog post?

Thanks to my editor-in-chief and online media advisor for picking up this rather stark omission :)

Hi all! Welcome to December’s Daring Cooks Challenge. This month’s challenge, hosted by the wonderful Simone from Junglefrog Cooking, is Salmon en Croute or some variation that essentially composes of meat (or vegetables for vegetarians/vegans) wrapped & baked in pastry. The suggested meat alternative to fish was Beef Wellington. However, me being me for those of you that have read a number of my challenge entries, I’m certainly not one to follow convention.

So, if that modestly nice looking pastry parcel is neither Salmon en Croute or Beef Wellington, then what exactly is contained within? The answer I shall provide below in the form of a joke.

Ok, if it wasn’t clear from the joke, that which is contained within pastry casing is essentially a turducken. However, the method used to make what I shall refer to as Turducken en Croute follows closely with the method used for making Beef Wellington. For the original recipe, please check out Simone’s blogpost of this month’s challenge. Note: Link to specific post will be provided once she publishes her entry.

Ok, Turducken en Croute sounds ridiculous but this is what I’m going with, as I prefer it to Turduckenellington :P

For those of you that don’t know what a turducken is, a turducken is, like its name, a combination of a turkey, duck and chicken, all amassed into a single unit of meaty goodness.

If done properly.

I say this because in my case, well, let’s just say it wasn’t done as properly as I’d like. To be frank, though I did not find the end result to be an utter failure, there were a lot of areas for improvement. I’ll go through what I felt could have been done better throughout the course of this post.

Problem 1 – Freestylin’. What I refer to freestylin’ is essentially my impatience for following recipe’s directions and either improvising certain steps or substitutions, or in this case, cooking entirely off the top of my head without a recipe as a guide. Though, to be fair, finding a guide for Turducken en Croute is somewhat of a challenge as I wasn’t able to come across any references of cooking a turducken within pastry, let alone an actual recipe. So, if you find the steps and quantities somewhat vague or imprecise, apologies in advance. It’s just the way I cook.

Speaking of cooking…

This is the core of my Turducken en Croute. The three layers of meat (starting from the bottom) are the drumstick of a turkey wing fillet (light meat layer), duck thigh fillet (dark meat layer) & 2 x drumstick of a chicken wing fillet. Each of the meat fillets were pounded with a meat mallet separately. Though some tenderising does occur, the main reason why this was done was to spread out the meat into a flat mass in order to make it easier to roll. As the chicken was to be the centre layer, after tenderising the meat, it was amassed into a more sausage like shape, rather than a flat mass.

Next, lay out a sheet of plastic wrap and lay down each of the meats in the order shown above i.e. from the bottom, turkey, duck then chicken. Before placing the layers together, make sure to season each layer generously with salt and pepper. I guess had I more time and forethought, I could have brined all the meats and done away with layers of seasoning. It’s up to you as to how you want to do it.

Roll the mass of meat together and twist the ends tight into a sausage-like form as shown above. Place into the freezer for about an hour to firm up the meat so that it will retain its shape when removed from the plastic.

Bear in mind that the plastic is only wrapped on the outside and there should not be any part of it rolled into the mass of meat. Rather than explain in detail on how to do this, the Youtube video of Gordon Ramsay making Beef Wellington should show you the process, as well as give a quick guide as to how Beef Wellington is prepared.

Lay down another sheet of plastic wrap, on top of which strips of prosciutto are layered to form a sheet of sorts. Take the firmed meat roll from the freezer and place onto the end of the prosciutto sheet, as shown. However, there should be a step just after you lay down the prosciutto and before you place the turducken roll on top. More on that below.

Problems 2 – Ingredients for absorption layer/stuffing. In a traditional Beef Wellington, there is a layer of mushroom duxelle i.e. mushroom paste. The layer of duxelle not only bring an element of flavour & texture but it also serves as an absorption buffer for the juices that will inevitably be drawn out of the meat during the cooking process. What I decided on was dried cranberries & roasted pine nuts. I don’t think that it was a bad choice to go with this, as it tasted fine together. My issue was that I over estimated the absorption properties of the dried cranberries. In hindsight, I would also look to include other moisture-holding ingredients, such as dried bread crumbs.

Problem 3 – Placement of absorption layer. If you watched the Gordon Ramsay Youtube video above, you’ll see that the mushroom duxelle (acting as an absorption layer) is incorporated between the meat and the prosciutto. My mistake in this case was to incorporate the absorption layer between the prosciutto and the puff pastry.

For those of you that don’t know, moisture and puff pastry aren’t the best of friends. They’re not even on speaking terms with each other.

Anyhow, to move on with what should have been the process to follow, chop dried cranberries & toasted pine nuts into fine pieces. Incorporate bread crumbs to the cranberry & pine nut mix. Place a thin layer of the cranberry mix on top of the prosciutto.

Carefully roll the prosciutto & turducken meat into a roll as per the image above. This time around, though the plastic may be used to help with the rolling, there isn’t a need to wrap it in the same fashion as the previous step.

Lay out a sheet of puff pastry and place the meat roll at one end. Roll the puff pastry around the meat roll as tightly as you can, minimising any air pockets between the puff pastry and the meat.

Once you’ve finished rolling the puff pastry, it should look very much like the first image (top left). As shown in that image, turn the roll around so that the seam is showing at the top.

Now, for anyone familiar with wrapping presents, the rest of this should be pretty straight forward. Essentially follow the steps shown in the image above i.e. fold down the top (top right), fold across on one side (bottom left) then fold across on the other side (bottom right).

Do the above steps on both sides and you should end up with something like that. The reason why the end tabs are not folded over at this stage is that a little egg wash should be applied to each tab to help it stick down onto the pastry and not lift away during the cooking process.

Turn the pastry roll over and apply an egg wash to the outer surfaces. If you haven’t learned from experience already, don’t egg wash the bottom. It’ll only stick to whatever it’s sitting on.

If you have it, place a probe thermometer so that the probe is located within the centre of the turducken meat. Bake in a 180 degree (Celsius) oven until the internal temperature reaches 75 degrees. For the mass of meat that I had, this took around 40 minutes.

If you don’t have a probe thermometer, good luck. Unfortunately, you’re on your own on this one as turkey, duck & chicken are not so forgiving when it comes to slightly undercooking it. This is why I selected fattier cuts of meat over breast. As there is more fat content within these pieces, they’re a little more forgiving if you overcook them.

Remove the Turducken en Croute from the oven and allow to rest. I gave it 20 minutes and the centre was still plenty hot when I carved into it. Make sure to NOT cover the pastry as you might resting other meats. Remember, puff pastry and moisture are not on speaking terms :)

The cross-section cut of the Turducken en Croute. Notice how the moisture has affected the bottom layer of puff pastry, or should I say puff pasty. Had the cranberry mix been incorporated where it should have been, I believe the prosciutto would have helped prevent any moisture making contact with the puff pastry.

Overall, I liked the flavours, though the meat ended up being just a little too dry & tough from being slightly overcooked. This is where brining may have helped.

I loved the concept of this dish but if I were to make this again, there’s much that’ll needs to be dealt with in order to end up with a better result.

To conclude this post, how would you have dealt with the issues that I’d encountered differently? Do you feel that there is a better way to deal with the moisture content than what I’ve suggested? Would love to hear your thoughts & suggestions on this matter.

Ok, I’ll level with you. The little birds nest creation above looks nothing like what this month’s Daring Bakers challenge is meant to look like. This creation was born out of the need to improvise; part inspiration and desperation alike.

This is in fact meant to be a reasonably well known Italian pastry. Can you guess what this month’s challenge is meant to be?

Cannoli. Image shamefully stolen from the wonderful host for this month’s Daring Baker’s challenge Lisa Michele of Parsley, Sage, Desserts and Line Drives.

Believe me, I tried making it look something along these lines. Without possessing, or the willingness to possess, unitaskers such that I see cannoli forms as, some creativity was in order.

Now, creativity isn’t exactly a bad thing. You could take the creativity even further (albeit with words this time), by saying that this was a deconstruction or reinvention of the cannoli. I’ve probably just offended a lot of Italians and cannoli lovers alike. However, one thing I can say is that, whatever this may be called, it uses the ingredients for making the cannoli as outlined by this month’s host. It also doesn’t taste too bad either :)

Ok, being somewhat late to release this post (I won’t go into the reasons here), I’ll keep this as streamlined as possible. The main recipe as prescribed by this month’s host will be listed in full at the end of this post. What I’ll incorporate below are my variations that have deviated from the original recipe.

Lemon Mascapone Eggs in Toffee Nest

Egg Shells

There are instructions below for to create a stack from the cannoli recipe rather than the traditional tubes. In the instructions it states:

If they balloon up in the hot oil, dock them lightly prior to frying.

Though I can understand that this would be desirable for creating flat discs of cannoli pastry. However, in my case, I used the ballooning effect to my advantage.

Once you get to the stage when you start cutting out rounds from the dough, rather than getting the recommended sized cutter, I went with one of the smallest ones I had in my arsenal (about 2cm or approx. 1 inch in diameter). These small rounds were left as flat discs when inserted into the deep fryer.

They should puff up to an egg-like shape, creating an air pocket within. As only on side of the egg is ever in contact with the oil, I used a ladle to constantly pour the fryer oil over the top side of the egg for even cooking. I found that trying to turn the egg over to the other side was nigh on impossible.

Once the eggs have turned a golden brown, remove them from the fryer and place onto a rack to drain any excess oil.

Egg Filling

The filling is a very simple lemon mascapone. The steps are pretty straight forward.

Firstly, place the contents of the mascapone into a mixing bowl. Incorporate either castor or icing sugar to taste to the mascapone and mix with either a whisk or a spoon until the sugar is fully integrated.

Once you’re happy with the level of sweetness, now incorporate enough lemon juice to taste. The mixture should end up like the consistency of lightly whipped cream or room temperature butter.

Place the filling into the fridge to chill, which will firm up its texture.

Once the filling has been chilled, using either the finest piping bag attachment you have or a syringe plunger (without the needle part), poke a small hole into the egg and pipe in the filling until the egg is just about full. You’ll find that with the egg, that the shell is thin on one side, which should make penetration easy. Otherwise, you can create a hole using a skewer or the pointy end of a pairing knife. Just make sure to take care and not stab yourself whilst doing so!

Nest

For the nest, I simply followed the steps outlined in the following recipe from the Taste website. I found that this method was a little random, creating fine strands (desired) and dark clumps alike (undesired). Anyways, once you’ve accumulated enough toffee strands, shape to form the nest for the eggs.

That’s it for my portion of the post. I wish I had more time to better flesh out this post and incorporate more step-by-step images. Anyhow, as promised, the recipe for the intended method of making cannoli is listed below. Thanks again to this month’s Daring Bakers challenge host for their selection.

Equipment:
Cannoli forms/tubes – optional, but recommended if making traditional shaped cannoli. Dried cannelloni pasta tubes work just as well!
Deep, heavy saucepan, enough to hold at least 2-3-inches of oil or deep fryer
Deep fat frying thermometer. although the bread cube or bit of dough test will work fine.
Metal tongs
Brass or wire skimmer OR large slotted spoon
Pastry bag with large star or plain tip, but a snipped ziplock bag, butter knife or teaspoon will work fine.
Cooling rack
Paper bags or paper towels
Pastry Brush
Cheesecloth
Sieve or fine wire mesh strainer
Electric Mixer, stand or hand, optional, as mixing the filling with a spoon is fine.
Food Processor or Stand Mixer – also optional, since you can make the dough by hand, although it takes more time.
Rolling pin and/or Pasta roller/machine
Pastry or cutting board
Round cutters – The dough can also be cut into squares and rolled around the cannoli tube prior to frying. If making a stacked cannoli, any shaped cutter is fine, as well as a sharp knife.
Mixing bowl and wooden spoon if mixing filling by hand
Plastic Wrap/Clingfilm
Tea towels or just cloth towels

Lidisano’s Cannoli
Makes 22-24 4-inch cannoli
Prep time:
Dough – 2 hours and 10-20 minutes, including resting time, and depending on whether you do it by hand or machine.
Filling – 5-10 minutes plus chilling time (about 2 hours or more)
Frying – 1-2 minutes per cannoli
Assemble – 20–30 minutes

RECIPE NOTE: THE EQUIVALENTS FROM THIS RECIPE WERE PREPARED USING THIS CONVERSION SITE: http://www.gourmetsleuth.com/index.asp.

CANNOLI SHELLS
2 cups (250 grams/8.82 ounces) all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons(28 grams/1 ounce) sugar
1 teaspoon (5 grams/0.06 ounces) unsweetened baking cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon (1.15 grams/0.04 ounces) ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon (approx. 3 grams/0.11 ounces) salt
3 tablespoons (42 grams/1.5 ounces) vegetable or olive oil
1 teaspoon (5 grams/0.18 ounces) white wine vinegar
Approximately 1/2 cup (approx. 59 grams/approx. 4 fluid ounces/approx. 125 ml) sweet Marsala or any white or red wine you have on hand
1 large egg, separated (you will need the egg white but not the yolk)
Vegetable or any neutral oil for frying – about 2 quarts (8 cups/approx. 2 litres)
1/2 cup (approx. 62 grams/2 ounces) toasted, chopped pistachio nuts, mini chocolate chips/grated chocolate and/or candied or plain zests, fruits etc.. for garnish
Confectioners’ sugar

Note – If you want a chocolate cannoli dough, substitute a few tablespoons of the flour (about 25%) with a few tablespoons of dark, unsweetened cocoa powder (Dutch process) and a little more wine until you have a workable dough (Thanks to Audax).

CANNOLI FILLING
2 lbs (approx. 3.5 cups/approx. 1 kg/32 ounces) ricotta cheese, drained
1 2/3 cups cup (160 grams/6 ounces) confectioner’s sugar, (more or less, depending on how sweet you want it), sifted
1/2 teaspoon (1.15 grams/0.04 ounces) ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon (4 grams/0.15 ounces) pure vanilla extract or the beans from one vanilla bean
3 tablespoons (approx. 28 grams/approx. 1 ounce) finely chopped good quality chocolate of your choice
2 tablespoons (12 grams/0.42 ounces) of finely chopped, candied orange peel, or the grated zest of one small to medium orange
3 tablespoons (23 grams/0.81 ounce) toasted, finely chopped pistachios

Note – If you want chocolate ricotta filling, add a few tablespoons of dark, unsweetened cocoa powder to the above recipe, and thin it out with a few drops of warm water if too thick to pipe.

DIRECTIONS FOR SHELLS:
1. In the bowl of an electric stand mixer or food processor, combine the flour, sugar, cocoa, cinnamon, and salt. Stir in the oil, vinegar, and enough of the wine to make a soft dough. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and well blended, about 2 minutes. Shape the dough into a ball. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest in the fridge from 2 hours to overnight.

2 Cut the dough into two pieces. Keep the remaining dough covered while you work. Lightly flour a large cutting or pastry board and roll the dough until super thin, about 1/16 to 1/8” thick (An area of about 13 inches by 18 inches should give you that). Cut out 3 to 5-inch circles (3-inch – small/medium; 4-inch – medium/large; 5-inch;- large. Your choice). Roll the cut out circle into an oval, rolling it larger and thinner if it’s shrunk a little.

3 Oil the outside of the cannoli tubes (You only have to do this once, as the oil from the deep fry will keep them well, uhh, oiled..lol). Roll a dough oval from the long side (If square, position like a diamond, and place tube/form on the corner closest to you, then roll) around each tube/form and dab a little egg white on the dough where the edges overlap. (Avoid getting egg white on the tube, or the pastry will stick to it.) Press well to seal. Set aside to let the egg white seal dry a little.

4. In a deep heavy saucepan, pour enough oil to reach a depth of 3 inches, or if using an electric deep-fryer, follow the manufacturer’s directions. Heat the oil to 375°F (190 °C) on a deep fry thermometer, or until a small piece of the dough or bread cube placed in the oil sizzles and browns in 1 minute. Have ready a tray or sheet pan lined with paper towels or paper bags.

5. Carefully lower a few of the cannoli tubes into the hot oil. Do not crowd the pan. Fry the shells until golden, about 2 minutes, turning them so that they brown evenly.

8. Lift a cannoli tube with a wire skimmer or large slotted spoon, out of the oil. Using tongs, grasp the cannoli tube at one end. Very carefully remove the cannoli tube with the open sides straight up and down so that the oil flows back into the pan. Place the tube on paper towels or bags to drain. Repeat with the remaining tubes. While they are still hot, grasp the tubes with a potholder and pull the cannoli shells off the tubes with a pair of tongs, or with your hand protected by an oven mitt or towel. Let the shells cool completely on the paper towels. Place shells on cooling rack until ready to fill.

9. Repeat making and frying the shells with the remaining dough. If you are reusing the cannoli tubes, let them cool before wrapping them in the dough.

Pasta Machine method:
1. Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces. Starting at the middle setting, run one of the pieces of dough through the rollers of a pasta machine. Lightly dust the dough with flour as needed to keep it from sticking. Pass the dough through the machine repeatedly, until you reach the highest or second highest setting. The dough should be about 4 inches wide and thin enough to see your hand through

2. Continue rolling out the remaining dough. If you do not have enough cannoli tubes for all of the dough, lay the pieces of dough on sheets of plastic wrap and keep them covered until you are ready to use them.

3, Roll, cut out and fry the cannoli shells as according to the directions above.

For stacked cannoli:
1. Heat 2-inches of oil in a saucepan or deep sauté pan, to 350-375°F (176 – 190 °C).

2. Cut out desired shapes with cutters or a sharp knife. Deep fry until golden brown and blistered on each side, about 1 – 2 minutes. Remove from oil with wire skimmer or large slotted spoon, then place on paper towels or bags until dry and grease free. If they balloon up in the hot oil, dock them lightly prior to frying. Place on cooling rack until ready to stack with filling.

DIRECTIONS FOR FILLING:
1. Line a strainer with cheesecloth. Place the ricotta in the strainer over a bowl, and cover with plastic wrap and a towel. Weight it down with a heavy can, and let the ricotta drain in the refrigerator for several hours to overnight.

2. In a bowl with electric mixer, beat ricotta until smooth and creamy. Beat in confectioner’s sugar, cinnamon, vanilla and blend until smooth. Transfer to another bowl and stir in chocolate, zest and nuts. Chill until firm.(The filling can be made up to 24 hours prior to filling the shells. Just cover and keep refrigerated).

ASSEMBLE THE CANNOLI:
1. When ready to serve..fill a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch plain or star tip, or a ziplock bag, with the ricotta cream. If using a ziplock bag, cut about 1/2 inch off one corner. Insert the tip in the cannoli shell and squeeze gently until the shell is half filled. Turn the shell and fill the other side. You can also use a teaspoon to do this, although it’s messier and will take longer.

2. Press or dip cannoli in chopped pistachios, grated chocolate/mini chocolate chips, candied fruit or zest into the cream at each end. Dust with confectioner’s sugar and/or drizzles of melted chocolate if desired.

PUMPKIN FILLING
1/2 cup (123 grams/4.34 ounces) ricotta cheese, drained
1/2 cup (113 grams/4.04 ounces) mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup (122.5 grams/4.32 ounces) canned pumpkin, drained like ricotta
3/4 cup (75 grams/2.65 ounces) confectioner’s sugar, sifted
1/2 to 1 teaspoon (approx. 1.7 grams/approx. 0.06 ounces) pumpkin pie spice (taste)
1/2 teaspoon (approx. 2 grams/approx. 0.08 ounces) pure vanilla extract
6-8 cannoli shells

1. In a bowl with electric mixer, beat ricotta and mascarpone until smooth and creamy. Beat in confectioner’s sugar, pumpkin, pumpkin pie spice, vanilla and blend until smooth. Transfer to another bowl, cover and chill until it firms up a bit. (The filling can be made up to 24 hours prior to filling the shells. Just cover and keep refrigerated).

2. Fill the shells as directed above. I dipped the ends of the shells in caramelized sugar and rolled them in toasted, chopped pecans.

TIPS AND NOTES:
- Dough must be stiff and well kneaded

- Rolling the dough to paper thinness, using either a rolling pin or pasta machine, is very important. If the dough is not rolled thin enough, it will not blister, and good cannoli should have a blistered surface.

- Initially, this dough is VERY stubborn, but keep rolling, it eventually gives in. Before cutting the shapes, let the dough rest a bit, covered, as it tends to spring back into a smaller shapes once cut. Then again, you can also roll circles larger after they’re cut, and/or into ovals, which gives you more space for filling.

- Your basic set of round cutters usually doesn’t contain a 5-inch cutter. Try a plastic container top, bowl etc, or just roll each circle to 5 inches. There will always be something in your kitchen that’s round and 5-inches if you want large cannoli.

- Oil should be at least 3 inches deep and hot – 360°F-375°F, or you’ll end up with greasy shells. I prefer 350°F – 360°F because I felt the shells darkened too quickly at 375°F.

- If using the cannoli forms, when you drop the dough on the form into the oil, they tend to sink to the bottom, resulting in one side darkening more. Use a slotted spoon or skimmer to gently lift and roll them while frying.

- DO NOT crowd the pan. Cannoli should be fried 2-4 at a time, depending on the width of your saucepan or deep fryer. Turn them once, and lift them out gently with a slotted spoon/wire skimmer and tongs. Just use a wire strainer or slotted spoon for flat cannoli shapes.

- When the cannoli turns light brown – uniform in color, watch it closely or remove it. If it’s already a deep brown when you remove it, you might end up with a really dark or slightly burnt shell.

- Depending on how much scrap you have left after cutting out all of your cannoli shapes, you can either fry them up and sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar for a crispy treat, or let the scraps rest under plastic wrap and a towel, then re-roll and cut more cannoli shapes.

- Push forms out of cannoli very gently, being careful not to break the shells as they are very delicate. DO NOT let the cannoli cool on the form, or you may never get it off without it breaking. Try to take it off while still hot. Hold it with a cloth in the center, and push the form out with a butter knife or the back of a spoon.

- When adding the confectioner’s sugar to the filling..TASTE. You may like it sweeter than what the recipe calls for, or less sweet, so add in increments.

- Fill cannoli right before serving! If you fill them an hour or so prior, you’ll end up with soggy cannoli shells.

- If you want to prepare the shells ahead of time, store them in an airtight container, then re-crisp in a 350°F (176 °C) oven for a few minutes, before filling.

- Practice makes perfect. My first batch of shells came out less than spectacular, and that’s an understatement. As you go along, you’ll see what will make them more aesthetically pleasing, and adjust accordingly when rolling. My next several batches turned out great. Don’t give up!!

I heart pizza. In my eyes, even when it’s bad, it’s still alright. I mean, how can you go wrong when crusty bread and warm melted cheese serve as the foundation on which most pizzas, great and small, are built apon.

Though pizzas are quite readily available at many a restaurant, over the phone, the Internet and heck, even in a shopping mall food court or the freezer section of any supermarket if you’re desperate enough, there’s a certain sense of satisfaction to be had when attempting to make pizza at home, especially for the first time.

While I was at the Good Food & Wine Show earlier this year, I had the opportunity to sample a four cheese pizza made by an award winning pizza maker. One of the cheeses, a smoke cheddar, brought out a lovely smokey note to the pizza. It’s something that’s stuck in the back of my mind ever since.

So with that smokey note in mind, it seemed only natural for me to take that sublime smokiness to another level by incorporating as many smokey elements into the pizza as possible. Smokey pizza sauce base, smokey pepperoni and, of course, some smokey cheddar cheese.

Smokey BBQ Pepperoni Pizza

Ingredients

The mise en place for my Smokey BBQ Pepperoni Pizza consists of the following ingredients:

Pizza base, adapted from Heston Blumental’s recipe from the In Search of Perfection TV series (makes 4 single serve pizzas)

• 350g flour, with a high protein content (11g per 100g or 11% in my case).
• 195g tepid water (not pictured)
• 1/2 tsp of malt syrup
• 1 tsp salt
• 7g instant yeast (approx. 1 sachet)
• oil or oil spray

Toppings (per serve of pizza)

• 8 slices of pepperoni
• 1/4 cup of mozzarella cheese, grated
• 1/4 cup of smoked cheddar cheese, grated
• 1-2 tbsp smokey BBQ sauce (not pictured)

With the ingredients in the above image, standard supermarket varieties were used. However, feel free to up the ante and use artisan products. This would no doubt turn up the flavour quotient to 11!

Method

• In a large mixing bowl, add the flour and create a well in the centre.
• Combine the water & malt syrup together, and pour the water/syrup mixture into the well.
• Incorporate all the flour into the liquid until a dough ball forms.
• Dust a little flour onto a clean work surface.
• Remove the ball of dough from the bowl and proceed to need the dough for approx. 10 minutes.
• Place the dough back into the bowl and allow to rest for 15 mins. Once rested, when the dough is stretched, it should be soft and somewhat elastic.
• Add the salt and yeast into the bowl, and proceed to kneed into the dough until its just incorporated.
• Remove the dough from the bowl and proceed to kneed for another 10 minutes.
• Portion the dough into four equal portions.
• With each of the four dough portions, roll the dough until it forms a smooth ball.
• Rub or spray a little oil onto a tray.
• Place the dough balls into the oiled tray, making sure to allow for plenty of room for the dough to double in size.
• Cover the dough with oiled plastic wrap and leave for approx. 2 hours.

After two hours, the dough ball should look something like this.

• Place the dough on a floured work surface.
• Use your hands to form a thin pizza base, making sure to spread out the dough evenly.
• Place the pizza base onto a baking tray.

• Apply the smokey bbq sauce to the pizzza base.

In my case, I used a Smoked Pepper Marinade manufactured by Maxwells Treats (website). It is the best smokey bbq sauce that I’ve come across to date. However, feel free to substitute whatever variety of smokey barbecue sauce you favour or you find readily available.

• Add the grated cheese.

• Lay out the pepperoni slices evenly over the pizza.
• Place the pizza into a preheated 250 degrees Celsius oven.
• Remove from oven once the base has browned and is crisped, approx. 3-5 mins.

Your pizza should end up looking something like it.

The pizza has a sublime smokey taste throughout. The smokey elements from the sauce, cheese and pepperoni work together without overpowering each other. The base has a wonderfully crispy crust on the bottom, while the rest of the base is pleasantly chewy.

If you find that the base is done before the top of the pizza has cooked (like I had with my first batch), remove the pizza from the oven and place under a grill until the cheese develops a nice brown crust. Depending on your oven, you may need to play around with temperature and cooking time until you get the right balance so that you don’t need to resort to the grill quick-fix.

The cheese cooked just the way I like it. Yum!

The wonderful brown crust of the underside of the pizza.

If making the pizza dough is too much effort, or you get somewhat peckish during the two hour waiting period as you wait for the dough to rise, you could still make the most of these wonderfully smokey ingredients by substituting the pizza base for bread slices and toast them under the grill.

Just make sure that when you do, that you toast one side of the bread first under the grill, then turn over and then place the ingredients onto the untoasted side before placing it back into the grill. That way you’ll end up with a nice, crusty bottom rather than a soft, soggy one.

Even on toasted bread, pepperoni and cheese looks so good!

Feel free to give this recipe a go, or at the very least the pizza base portion of it. That way you could let your imagination run wild with recipe ideas and flavour combinations.

If you were to make your own pizza at home, what sort of pizza would you make?