Pastiera
Pastiera Napoletana is a typical Easter dessert of the Neapolitan tradition, prepared with cow’s milk ricotta, cooked wheat and eggs.
According to an ancient legend, the first to prepare this dessert was the Partenope siren, to whom the birth of the city of Naples is also attributed.
The inhabitants of the place, just to thank the mermaid for having chosen the Gulf of Naples as her home, commissioned 7 of the most beautiful girls of the villages to bring her each one a gift of nature: flour, ricotta, eggs, soft wheat, essence of flowers of orange, spices and sugar. So Partenope, having received the gifts, decided to mix them together, giving birth to the pastiera.
Online you can find a lot of variations, with custard, with rice, with pasta instead of wheat, with cinnamon or without and every family has kept its own recipe for generations, for this reason you will never find two identical pastieras and at the first taste you will be pleasantly enraptured or too involved by the decisive taste not to be able to appreciate it. This is the second peculiarity, you love it or hate it, there is no middle ground.
Il Casatiello, sweet or salty?
Let’s start with my favourite, the salty casatiello,
It symbolizes the Christian Easter already in its shape. The circle of the donut represents both the crown of thorns placed on Jesus’ head and the continuous cycle of life with the Resurrection.
The eggs and the crossed ribbons above the dome of the eggs recall the Calvary, the crucifixion and rebirth.
Even the presence of pecorino cheese in the dough has its own symbolic value. In fact, it is made of sheep’s milk hence the lamb which is a symbol of purity and innocence.
The casatiello owes its name to the “caso”, the cheese or cacio, which together with the cured meats forms the filling.
The Neapolitan casatiello involves the use of suet and raw eggs placed on top in a radial pattern and which will be hard-boiled at the end of cooking, otherwise it is a Tortano.
At Easter, but especially on Easter Monday, this delicacy cannot be missing.
It is customary to alternate the slice of casatiello with one of salami and a glass of red wine
