SICILIAN CASSATA CAKE
(Cassata Siciliana)
Makes one 23 cm/9 inch cassata
ALMOND PASTE
One-third recipe pasta reale
3 drops green food colouring
RICOTTA CREAM
450 g/1 lb fresh ricotta, well drained (see note)
125-350 g/4-12 oz sugar
75 g/3 oz plain chocolate pieces
50 g/2 oz diced zuccata or candied citron
PAN DI SPAGNA SPONGE CAKE
5 eggs at room temperature
225 g/8 oz sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
150 g/5 oz self-raising flour or non-waxy corn flour (see note)
ICING
1 egg white
175 g/6 oz sugar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
5 tablespoons Marsala wine
Candied fruit (pear halves, orange slices or wedges, cherries, apricots, strips of citron, or ribbons of zuccata)
Prepare the almond paste according to the recipe, and knead into the paste 3 drops of food colouring so that it becomes pale green. Put aside.
Prepare the ricotta cream according to the instructions given in the cuccìa recipe. Commercial pastry shops make a very sweet cream for their cassate, for the simple reason that they keep longer that way. Many Sicilians do like that much sweetness, and some Sicilian recipes call for as much as 350 g/12 oz of sugar, but as far as I am concerned, 75 g/3 oz is plenty.
Prepare the pan di Spagna. Separate the egg yolks from the whites, and put the yolks in a large glass or ceramic bowl set over, but not in, boiling water.
Beat the yolks until fluffy, adding the sugar slowly and beating until the sugar dissolves.
Put the flour or starch and baking powder into a sifter, and sift them into the egg yolks, little by little, beating to incorporate them well. Beat the egg whites until soft peaks form, and fold them into the mixture.
Remove from the heat and pour into a greased and floured 23 cm/9 inch round spring-form cake tin. Bake in a preheated 180C/350F/gas mark 4 oven for about 30 minutes or until done (i.e., when a straw poked into the middle of the cake comes out dry).
Allow the pan di Spagna to cool completely before starting to assemble the cassata. Ideally one should be equipped with a special cassata mould, which is a cake tin with very sloping sides, but any round 23 cm/9 inch tin or casserole will do, provided its sides aren’t exactly perpendicular and that it is at least 5 cm/2 inches deep. Line the pan with greaseproof paper, using a dab of jam or of the ricotta cream to stick the paper to the pan (this is not really necessary if using a non-stick pan).
On a surface dusted with a little icing sugar, roll out the almond paste to a thickness of less than 6 mm/¼ inch, and cut out 8 rectangles 4 cm/1½ inches by 5 cm/2 inches.
Using a serrated bread knife, with great delicacy cut the pan di Spagna so that you have two layers about 2 cm/¾ inch thick, and one slightly thinner layer. From this last layer cut 8 rectangles similar to those of almond paste.
Line the sides of the pan, alternating rectangles of almond paste with rectangles of pan di Spagna (put the cut sides of the cake outside). Trim one of the remaining layers of pan di Spagna so that it will fit into the bottom of the pan. Sprinkle with half of the Marsala, and spread with the ricotta cream. Sprinkle the last layer of pan di Spagna with the rest of the Marsala, and fit it on top of the ricotta cream, trimming if necessary so that it fits within the outer circle of paste and sponge. Cover with cling-film and refrigerate for a couple of hours.
Prepare the icing. Beat the egg white into soft peaks, add the sugar and the lemon juice and continue to beat at high speed for at least 5 minutes or until it becomes thick.
Remove the cassata from the refrigerator, take off the cling-film, and turn the cake out upside down on a serving plate. Spread icing over the cake in a very thin layer (it must be thin enough so that the contrast between the green paste and the pale yellow sponge shows through). Decorate with candied fruit and refrigerate until 20 minutes before serving.
Note: Pan di Spagna, which as its name indicates, was probably brought to Sicily by the Spanish, is not meant to be that moist and flavourful thing that we think of as “cake”. It is basically a support, whether it be for ricotta cream, as in the present case; for an egg custard, as in zuppa imprescia; or for every imaginable layer of goodness, as in “the triumph of gluttony”. As such, pan di Spagna should have as light and delicate a texture as possible, but not much character is expected of it, and moistness is usually added by soaking it with rum, Marsala, or a sweet liqueur.
This recipe for pan di Spagna, which comes from a cousin, is very convenient because the quantity of each ingredient is calculated per egg, so that you can scale it to your purposes (the formula is 50 g/2 oz sugar, 35 g/1½ oz starch, and a little more than ½ teaspoon baking powder for every egg). This cousin uses wheat starch instead of self-raising flour to give an even firmer texture to the cake. I can find no reference to wheat starch in any American cookbook in my possession, and don’t know if it is available in Britain, but according to The Joy of Cooking non-waxy corn flour can be substituted for self-raising flour.
I am of the opinion that cassata siciliana offers less than meets the eye, for on the inside it is unrelieved sweetness. It is also difficult to make beautifully, and since I can see no point in a sloppy cassata, I would suggest that all but the most dexterous leave it to the professionals and settle instead for its country cousin, known as cassata al forno. This is much simpler, a ricotta cream enveloped in a crust of pasta frolla.
