For the pastry:

300g flour

3 egg yolks

Salt a pinch

150g sugar

140g butter

The filling:

3 or 4 eggs

250g fresh ricotta

100g smoked provola (chopped into cubes)

250g fior di latte (or cow mozzarella)

2 fresh Italian sausages

100g salami or prosciutto (finely shredded by hand)

100g parmesan cheese (grated)

Parsley (finely chopped)

Salt

Pepper

To paint the pie before baking:

1 egg

•⁠ ⁠Make the pastry, wrap it up in clingfilm (or something more of less airtight to prevent it from drying out) and let it rest in a cool place for at least an hour

•⁠ ⁠Once the pastry has rested roll out out to fit a pie dish (top, bottom and sides) of 20-22 cms in diameter and 5-6 cms in height.

•⁠ ⁠In a bowl mash the ricotta with a fork and add the eggs, continue until you have a homogenous consistency.

•⁠ ⁠Add the parmesan and all remaining ingredients.

•⁠ ⁠Place the pastry into an oiled / buttered pie or cake tin and then fill it with the filling mix. Cover with the final pastry circle and decorate as you with with any leftover pieces of pastry.

•⁠ ⁠Beat the remaining unused egg with a fork and paint the surface of the pie. I like to make three layers or so to make it glossy!

•⁠ ⁠I cook it at 180-200 degrees C for an hour or so, until it is golden brown.

•⁠ ⁠Allow it to cool before cutting and serving so that the melted filling does not run away!

Pizza Rustica

From the queen of Neapolitan cooking: Jean Caròla Francesconi's La Cucina Napoletana.

I remember still the first time I made pizza rustica, it was Valentine’s Day 2002, I was a student in London and we had spent New Year and the days succeeding with our great friend - Carola Francesconi's grandson - Paul, in Naples.

That was my first trip of more than a few hours to the city and I cannot recount the impressions it pushed into me: bright blue plastic buckets of vongole and other shellfish sitting in sea water on the street outside of homes awaiting their fate in the evening; the sun (it was the first time I ever walked around in a t shirt in January); the incredible Neopolitan parties which beat anything I have ever seen anywhere else in my life; salami Napolitano, bought from a place on the Via Carlo Poerio which sadly no longer exists; obviously my first real experience of mozzarella and pizza; Neopolitan roof terraces; the views from an empty Pompei and the 'Hotel Amore' in Amalfi and the colour of the sea, Italian marmalade, lemons...

To this day, pizza rustica is a dish that I seem to repeat almost every Valentine's Day. It's sweet crust is filled with ricotta, smoked cheese, fior di latte (a mozzarella with less moisture, making it ideal for cooking), prosciutto, fresh Italian sausage and more.

That crisp sweetness combined with the smoky, ham, cheesy soft insides that spill out when the pie is still a little warm is about the best you can get, and a dish not so well known outside of Naples or the south.

The cookbook has not been translated into English, so I share the recipe here below. All I can say is please do try it! You will never regret it.