Traditional Christmas Lasagna

We almost always had lasagna for Christmas when mom and dad were with us.

This is a actually a simple dish, but it takes a few minutes to assemble.

Start with a good tomato sauce, we use a meat sauce made with beef or meatballs, sausage and roast pork cooked in tomato/ tomato puree as I've described elsewhere.

This holiday I made three pounds of lasagna, with three pounds of ricotta, a pound and a half of mozzarella  and probably 4 sixteen ounce cans/jars of tomato.  I don't bother with tomato paste as the puree is really fine for the job.  (Tomato paste is really just condensed and preserved tomato puree to reconstitute when making sauce).

In addition to sauce you'll need: Pasta, Ricotta cheese, Eggs (one per pound of ricotta), grated Romano or parmigiano cheese, salt, pepper, dash of nutmeg, shredded mozzarella.  Combine ricotta, eggs, grated cheese, seasoning.  Cook pasta.  Layer sauce, pasta, ricotta mixture, mozzarella, sauce, pasta, etc.  Top the last layer of pasta with sauce, mozzarella and parmigiano.  Cover with foil and bake at 350.  Lasagna ALWAYS takes longer to heat through than it should.

Note the Ricotta in a tin - the way it used to be sold
before plastic containers

 Unfortunately I forgot to get pictures of the assembly or the finished product before it was half gone...

Dessert was Mom's Sour Cream Coffee Cake

Christmas Cookies Part Two

Today I made Aunt Margaret's Christmas Cookies.  Actually she used to make them for everything.  Christmas, New Year's, Easter, Birthdays, Mother's Day, Thanksgiving, you get the picture.

Her's were thicker and prettier than mine.  I make them thin so 1) I can get more cookies from the batch and 2) each one has fewer calories, so you can eat two.

Aunt Margaret’s Festive Italian Cookies

3 Cups Flour
2 Teaspoons baking power
½ Teaspoon salt

½ Cup sugar

¼ Pound butter

3 Eggs

1 Teaspoon vanilla

Sift first three dry ingredients together

Blend sugar and butter until creamy

Beat in eggs and vanilla

Add dry ingredients

Knead lightly

Roll out to ½ inch thick

Cut out round cookies with small cutter
(For a different shape, roll into ropes, cut and tie into knots)

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 – 12 minutes

Frosting

½ box Confectioners sugar

1 tsp lemon extract

1 tsp cold water or more as needed

Blend until a smooth, runny consistency is achieved

For colored frosting, divide into separate bowls add food color as desired

Frost the cookies by dipping, let dry

Christmas Cookies - Cuccidati and More

Well, I don't really like making cookies, mainly because I find it tedious...making dozens of individual cookies and baking them in batches...it just takes too long. Yet, I can't resist making cookies for Christmas. These two took all day Sunday.

The first are Cuccidati which I've posted before on Rebel. I did not grow up with these as they are Sicilian, but I've adopted them as my own since I first made them last season after seeing Clara make them on YouTube. Here are the ingredients. They are a pastry filled with figs and other dried and fresh fruits and nuts.

Fruits and Nuts

Through The Meat Grinder

Filling on dough

Roll Over

Cut

And Score

Baked

Cool

Frosted

CUCCIDATI  -  SICILIAN FIG COOKIES by Clara

FILLING:

Toast the nuts in a hot oven for 10 to 12 minutes.
Put all the following through a meat grinder and mix together:

¾ cups filberts (hazelnuts) toasted

½ cup almonds toasted

½ cup walnuts toasted 

½ cup pecans toasted 

2 pounds of dried figs

½ pound candied fruit/citron (substitute other dried fruit or even lemon or orange marmalade)

½ pound of raisins (mix dark and golden)

¼ pound of dates

1 whole large orange, skin and all

1 tangerine peel

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground cloves

½  teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon salt

Add 2 cups hot water

½ cup sugar

½ cup whisky or unflavored brandy (cognac)

This can sit overnight.  When ready to fill the pastry, put some of the filling into a zip-lock bag, cut a hole in the corner of the bag and squeeze (pipe) the filling out in a line at the edge of the dough, cut and roll so the dough surrounds the filling.

Dough/Crust

Blend by hand:

10 cups flour plus additional flour if dough is too soft

1 ½ cups sugar

2 heaping tablespoons of baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1pound lard (or Crisco)

Add:

1 cup cold milk

1 tablespoon vanilla

10 eggs, beaten (larger eggs might require more flour, smaller eggs might require a bit more milk)

Let stand at room temperature 1 hour before rolling (Add flour if the dough is too sticky or a little milk if too dry)

Divide the dough into manageable pieces and roll out to about 1/8  inch thick with a wooden dowel. Turn the dough over and dust with flour several times until the desired thickness is reached. (If you've made fettuccine you know the technique of wrapping the dough around the rolling pin and unrolling it on the revers side.)

Pipe out the filling in a line along the bottom edge of the dough, fold the dough over the filling making a roll or tube, gently seal the edge along the roll, cut along the top of the roll, cut on the bias into individual cookies. Place in baking sheet and snip the top/side of each cookie with scissors making 2 or 3 slits. Bake at 350, 12-15 minutes or till done.

NOTE: The amounts of dough and filling are roughly the amounts needed to use up each when making these cookies. HOWEVER, there will be leftovers...depending on the thickness of the rolled out dough sheets, the amount of filling you pipe onto the dough and how much excess dough you trim off, you may have more filling and/or more dough left. I usually ball up all the dough trimmings and roll it out, spread any leftover filling on the dough, roll it like a jelly roll, slice it into rounds and bake them like individual pinwheel pastries.

Frost with a mixture of confectioner sugar/water/lemon extract and decorate with colored sugar or sprinkles.  To make colored sugar, place 1/4 cup of sugar into a small container, add several drops of food color and shake.  Add more color for darker shades.

Watch Clara on YouTube


Part one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5tXODF4of0&feature=related

Part two:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhBZrPk2xaY

The second cookie is my Aunt Stella's variation on Italian Toto's.  Her secret ingredients are the black coffee, ground raisins and whisky/brandy - and the inordinate amount of cocoa.  Too many of these before bedtime will keep you awake.

Chocolate Frosted

Cookies Ready For Distribution

Aunt Stella’s Secret Recipe Chocolate Cookies

5 cups flour

1 cup sugar

½ can Hershey’s® Cocoa Powder

5 tsp baking powder

3 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

½ tsp ground cloves

1 tsp salt (optional)

1 box raisins, ground in a meat grinder, 

(then doused with 1/4 cup unflavored brandy [cognac]or whisky)

1 cup strong black coffee

1 stick of margarine (or Crisco)

1 tsp real vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Mix the coffee and vanilla into the ground up raisins

Mix all dry ingredients and shortening/margarine

Make a “well” in the dry ingredients and add the liquid/raisins 

Mix with a wooden spoon until evenly moist - the dough is very stiff - like Playdough®

Form into balls (3/4 inch) and place on a greased cookie sheet

Bake for 12 -15 minutes

Aunt Stella’s Secret Recipe Chocolate Cookie Frosting

½ can Hershey’s® Cocoa Powder

1 tsp real vanilla extract

6 tablespoons margarine softened (or butter)

1 box confectioner’s sugar

Some strong cold black coffee

Mix the first four ingredients and add black coffee - a teaspoon at a time

Blend and beat with a wooden spoon adding more black coffee a little at a time as needed to make a smooth, soft, but not runny, frosting – heavier and thicker than chocolate syrup but not as thick as a cake frosting…about the consistency of molasses.

Dip the cookies into the frosting and place on waxed paper until the frosting dries and hardens. 

I think the cloves and raisins give the chocolate a spicy fruitiness that is both subtle and pleasant.  There is a definite Sicilian/Arabic influence.