Friday, July 31, 2015

Pumpkin Cake: a doorway to Italian Jewish Cuisine!








 If you look over this blog you will see I have have an abiding interest in cuisines of the Middle East ... food & recipes from Morocco, North Africa, Syria and Libya, Israel and Palestine.   One of the attractions for me, living where I am at present, is the affinity between Indian cuisine and many of the classic dishes from these regions; a similar use of rice and grains, spices, breads and savoury pastries and dumplings.  

In the course of my ''virtual culinary travels" I recently came across mention of a fascinating cookbook on Italian Jewish cuisine and its links with Jewish migration from many of the above countries (except Israel, of course - being a relatively new country in this region): "Cucina Ebraica: Flavours of the Italian Jewish Kitchen" by American writer and food historian Joyce Goldstein.     The introduction to the book looks at the migration and history of the Jewish people living in various regions of Italy and the food and recipes that developed over time with the meeting of these two cultures.
There has been a Jewish presence in Rome, southern Italy, Sicily and Sardinia since the before the 2nd Century BC with waves of Jewish migrants from different parts of the world settling in Italy over the coming centuries.   Whilst many were forced to leave  the country during the Inquisition (those Catholics again!!), by and large they co-existed and integrated with the local communities (well, ok there WAS the Jewish Ghetto in Venice!) till the country was unified as one nation in 1848.   This rich blending of cultures continued through the 20th century until 1938 when Benito Mussolini joined forces with Hitler and his Italian fascist party suddenly embraced a policy of anti-Semitism almost as enthusiastically as the Nazis.   Porca Miseria!!
 As a consequence many members of the Jewish community were either killed or fled their homes and migrated to safer havens in other parts of the world.    Today the comparatively smaller Italian Jewish community mainly lives in areas around Rome, Milan and Turin but their history and influence within their adopted country can be still be seen quite dramatically in the legacy of a  distinctive Italian Jewish cuisine.

I have only just begun to explore Cucina Ebraica ... there are fabulous and unusual recipes for antipasti, meat & poultry and fish dishes.    But one recipe that immediately attracted me was in the Dolci or Desserts section ... a spice and fruit laden cake made with pumpkin puree, almonds, cinnamon and lemon zest.  I had never used pumpkin in a dessert before; perhaps I was put off by those sickly sweet sounding pumpkin pie recipes you read about in the US south?!   But as author Joyce Goldstein tells us, Torta di Zucca Baruca is a cake recipe "from the town of Treviso in the Veneto" and the use of pumpkin indicates  Sephardic origins.   (Sephardic Jews arrived in Italy starting in the 1490s when they were expelled from Spain.)
 The recipe is surprisingly simple to make once you have pureed the pumpkin.   I had to make some substitutes due to lack of availability of some ingredients in India: no candied citron so I left this out but increased the amount of dried fruit and lemon zest.   I also substitued dried cranberries for raisins (didn't have any in my cupboard!) and I used brandy instead of wine as it's too expensive to cook with in India!
The result was an impressive looking golden-hued cake with a lovely moist texture and a very subtle spicy - citrus taste ... goes perfectly with mangoes that were in season here the past few months.
Cucina Ebraica  was published in 1998 and is now unfortunately out of print. You can still get a copy on Amazon India for close to R10,000; but I managed to get a good second hand copy on the abebooks.com website (a second hand book portal with 35 million volumes) for US$5.00 plus postage to India.   A bargain if I ever saw one!
Torta di Zucca Barucca  (Pumpkin cake from the Veneto)
Ingredients:   I pumpkin or butternut squash around 1kg, 3/4 C unsalted butter, 3/4 C sugar, 1/2 C ground almonds, 1/2 C candied citron - minced, 1/3 C raisins soaked in 3T grappa or wine (I used cranberries soaked in brandy), grated zest of 2 lemons, I/2 C flour, 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1 t ground cinnamon, pinch of salt, 3 eggs - separated
Method:   Preheat oven to 160 dgrees C.  Butter a 9 inch cake pan & line base with parchment paper.
Peel and chop the pumpkin into 1/2 inch dice, discading seeds and fibres. Should have about 4 cups.   Melt butter in pot add pumpkin and cook covered for 25 mins till it is soft.   (At this stage I used a hand blender to puree it.)
Put in mixing bowl & whisk in sugar, almonds, citron, raisins (I chucked in the brandy too!) and lemon zest.    In another bowl sift together flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.  
Add flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and blend together ... then add 3 egg yolks until thoroughly combined.    Whisk the egg whites in separate clean bowl until stiff peaks form.   Fold the whites thoroughly into the pumpkin mixture and pour into prepared cake tin.   Don't over beat!
Bake 45 to 60 minutes till cooked.   (We currently have a small dodgy Indian electric oven so I cooked it the full hour.)    Remove to rack to cool, then invert onto plate, remove parchment paper and turn back upright onto a serving platter.
As my Italian-Australian friend Josephine would have said: Bello gusto!!!




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