Cannoli

The story

Cannoli is rooted in Sicily. Cannoli are one of Sicily's best-known pastries, with roots often connected to the island's layered Arab-Norman culinary history and later carnival traditions. Their precise beginnings are difficult to document, but the combination of fried pastry shells and sweetened ricotta became firmly embedded in Sicilian pastry culture. Cannoli are famous for textural contrast: a brittle, blistered shell surrounds a creamy ricotta filling that may be scented with citrus, chocolate or pistachio. Filling the shells close to serving time preserves the crispness that defines a good cannolo. In Sicily, cannoli belong to the tradition of elaborate sweets associated with feast days, celebrations and pasticcerie. Their international popularity has made them a symbol of Sicilian food, but the best versions still depend on the island's characteristic sheep's-milk ricotta.

Ingredients

• Main
• 75 gram plain flour150g plain flour
• pinch of bicarbonate of sodalarge pinch of bicarbonate of soda
• 0.5 tablespoon castor sugar1 tbsp castor sugar
• 0.25 teaspoon cinnamon½ tsp cinnamon
• 0.5 teaspoon cocoa powder1 tsp cocoa powder (optional)
• 15 gram butter30g butter
• 0.5 piece egg1 egg
• 25 millilitre marsala50ml marsala (or white wine)
• Sunflower oil for deep fryingSunflower oil for deep frying
• 25 gram dark chocolate melted50g dark chocolate melted
• handful of pistachio kernelshandful of pistachio kernels finely chopped
• icing sugar for dustingicing sugar for dusting
• For the fillingFor the filling
• 125 gram ricotta drained and beaten till fluffy250g ricotta drained and beaten till fluffy
• 50 gram mascarpone100g mascarpone
• 1 tablespoon candied peel2 tbsp finely chopped candied peel
• 1 tablespoon icing sugar2 tbsp icing sugar
• (you will need cannoli moulds available to buy online)(you will need cannoli moulds available to buy online)

Method

1. Method

   Tip the flour, sugar, bicarb, cinnamon and cocoa powder (if using) into a bowl with a pinch of salt, add the butter and rub into the dry ingredients until there are no lumps. Mix the egg yolk and the marsala, add this to the dry ingredients and knead into a smooth dough. Wrap and rest in the fridge (can be made ahead and fried the next day) Fill a deep-fat fryer, wok or a deep saucepan a third of the way up with oil. Cut the dough into pieces and, working one piece at a time, roll them out as thinly as you can – use a pasta machine if you have one. Heat the oil and keep an eye on it until it reaches 180 °C. Lay the dough out on a lightly floured surface and cut out circles about 11 cm across. Wrap each one around a cannoli mould, using some egg white to stick to the top edge down, and they are ready for frying. It's important to take care when cooking with hot oil. Keep the oil at 180°C and be careful of splashes or the oil overflowing onto the cooker could cause fire, a deep fat fryer is recommended for the best way to control the heat of the oil. Deep-fry the cannoli (with their moulds) one at a time, making sure they cook all over. They should take about 45-60 seconds. They should be golden brown and cook a little longer if they aren't the dough will bubble and blister. Carefully take each one out of the oil using tongs and shake the cannoli off the mould very carefully onto kitchen paper. As you fry each one, make sure that the oil stays at 180°C at all times and doesn't get any hotter. These will keep for 2-3 days in an airtight container. When the cannoli are cold, dip the end of each one into chocolate, then dip some of those into the pistachios. Leave to cool and harden. Beat the ricotta and mascarpone together, then stir in the candied peel and sugar. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag with a wide star nozzle and pipe it into the cannoli dust with icing sugar, then serve

Nutrition

per serving

Estimated from recipe type and current ingredient text; review before publishing formal nutritional claims.