RICOTTA APRICOTS

(Varcocchini)

Makes 4 dozen

800 g/1¾ lb ricotta (see note)

175 g/6 oz sugar

175 g/6 oz flour (see note)

4 eggs

¼ teaspoon vanilla extract

Vegetable oil for frying

125 g/4 oz caster sugar, or granulated sugar, finely ground

Allow the ricotta to drain well, then sieve it or run it through a food mill so that it is creamy. Beat in 175 g/6 oz of sugar, the flour, and the eggs, one by one, and finally the vanilla.

Heat 4-5 cm/1½-2 inches of oil in a pan, and drop the batter, half a teaspoon at a time, into the hot oil (about 190C/370F). The batter should puff up into round balls the size of small apricots (about 2.5 cm/1 inch in diameter). Fry slowly until they are a dark golden brown all over, then lift out and drain on paper towels.

You can grind the granulated sugar to an even finer grain in a mortar (in my household there are always young and impatient volunteers for this job, with which I might otherwise dispense) or in a blender. Sprinkle the sugar over the varcocchini and serve them while they are still warm.

Note: The Sicilian housewife normally keeps two different kinds of flour on hand: farina rimacinata or di semola, which is made from durum wheat and is used for making pasta and bread (more about this in Chapter Three); and a farina 00 made of soft spring wheat. Unless otherwise specified, I have used this farina 00 in testing these recipes. According to Carol Field’s excellent book The Italian Baker, the closest British equivalent to this farina 00 would be one part pastry flour to three parts plain flour. Very careful bakers may wish to go to the trouble of making up such a mixture; I myself would probably settle for plain flour.

Ricotta is used in much the same manner in a cake that also appears frequently on the tables of my husband’s home town of Alcamo. This is known as a pasticciotto, which I indulge myself in translating as “plump pasty”—sweet and homely.