Nothing says 'Buon Natale' like Italian Christmas cookies
Be it cream cheese sugar cookies or date pinwheels, nearly every family has a certain baked confection prepared during the holiday season that truly tastes, to them, like Christmas. In my mother's family, which has roots in Florence, Italy, Christmas tastes like "cenci" (pronounced chin-chee, Italian for "rags").
Cenci are haphazardly cut, deep-fried sweet crackers flavored with white wine. I can still see my "nonna," as Italian grandmothers are called, in her classic posture: standing in front of the stove in an orange, 1970s apron with one hand on her lower back and the other nudging cenci around in a pot of hot oil with a slotted spoon.
When the cenci were fried, she would put them in a paper bag and sift in powdered sugar. I can still remember the sound of her bracelets clinking together when she shook the bag vigorously to coat the cookies in sugar.
Recently I shared my cenci memories with Ben Bohen, a Juneau caterer who also had Italian grandparents. He grew up on Staten Island and his grandparents emigrated from a small town in southern Italy, near Naples, called Castellamare Di Stabia.
As a child he used to visit them in a Maryland near Washington, D.C., at Christmas time. His quintessential Christmas cookie was a cousin of cenci, called "strufoli," which are made of a dough very similar to cenci, and also deep fried. Strufoli are shaped like small marbles, coated with a firm honey candy and shaped into a Christmas tree.
"The strufoli is best eaten after it sits for a few hours; the honey forms a hard candy coat," Bohen said. "But as kids, when a beautiful plate of strufoli were sitting there, we would always want to steal tastes as soon as the plate was ready."
In the spirit of the holidays, Ben and I decided to collect the old recipes, and prepare our favorite Italian confections in the unofficial Juneau Empire test kitchen at my house.
Both cookies are essentially the same, made from an egg-based dough, flavored with liquor, deep fried and coated with sugar or honey.
"One thing I think is interesting is that today we tend to associate deep-fried desserts with street food and they are usually meant to be eaten hot like with fry bread, funnel cake or zepole," Bohen said. "But, both of these deserts are traditionally made in the home, and they are eaten at room temperature."
Though you don't need a deep fryer to make these cookies, you should have a candy thermometer so you can make sure your oil is the right temperature: 350 degrees. Also, for the most part the cookies should only be in the oil about 15 seconds. The temperature drops when you add the cookies, so before adding another batch, make sure the temperature has returned to 350.
"The reason it is really important to have the oil hot, is that if it is not that hot it will take strufoli longer to cook and they will soak up the oil and get heavy," Bohen said.
Also, make sure you have a plate with paper towels nearby to absorb the excess oil. With the cenci you can just put them directly into a paper bag, for the ceremonial cenci sugar shake.
Cenci
(this recipe may be halved)
4 cups flour
2 tablespoons butter, cubed
2 tablespoon sugar
14 teaspoon salt
One egg plus one egg yolk, beaten
about 34 cup dry white wine
powdered sugar
candy thermometer
Mix the flour, butter, sugar and salt with fingers or a pastry cutter until it has become a fine meal. Make it into a mound, push a round indentation in the center, pour in the egg and gradually combine, slowly adding about a half cup of wine. Try to form the dough into a ball, if it is too dry add a bit more wine until the dough does not crumble and is workable but not sticky. Knead the dough in the bowl for about five minutes until it is smooth, elastic and slightly shiny. Put a pot with about 3 inches of canola oil (my grandmother used peanut oil, but canola is better for you) on the stove and begin to heat the oil on medium heat. While the oil is heating, roll or pull the dough in a very thin sheet. Slice into long jagged shapes, like strips of cloth.
Fry the cookies in batches the hot oil until they are just golden, about 15-20 seconds each. (Note: It is easy to cook them for too long. They should bubble, but should not be brown. They continue to cook once they are out of the oil.) Immediately put the cenci in a paper bag, sift in plenty of powdered sugar, shake. Cenci can keep in a covered container for several days.
Strufoli
4 egg yolks
18 teaspoon of salt
4 teaspoons rum
about 2 cups flour
12 teaspoon baking powder
canola oil for frying
12 cup sugar
12 cup honey
colored sprinkles (optional)
grated orange peel (optional)
mixed candied fruit, cut into small pieces (optional)
Beat the egg yolks with the salt. Add rum and baking powder and one cup flour. Then add more flour gradually to make a soft but solid dough. Put the dough an a floured board and roll it out to one quarter inch. From the dough sheet, cut rods about half a thumb wide, then cut them into small pieces, the size of chickpeas. Pour about 3 inches of oil into heavy pan. Heat to 350 degrees. Fry strufoli for less than a minute, or until golden in color. After the strufoli are fried, combine honey and sugar in a pan large enough to hold the strufoli. When the honey and sugar are melted together, add the orange and candied fruit, if desired. Add the strufoli to the pan and mix with a wooden spoon until they are coated. Immediately put them on a serving plate and mold into a Christmas tree or wreath shape with a wet hand. Decorate with colored sprinkles. Allow to set for a few hours before serving.
Julia O'Malley can be reached at jomalley@juneauempire.com.