Blood Orange & Pistachio Olive Oil Cake

February 18, 2024 by Philip Buccellato in sweets

Here’s a riff on my previous upside down blood orange olive oil cake which opts for a blood orange glaze instead of sliced fruit. It’s a little less fussy, but equally as impressive. The crushed pistachios are completely optional but make for a wonderful compliment to the citrus. Video of the process down below.

Ingredients

1 cup all purpose flour

½ cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup cornmeal (coarse)

3/4 cup fine granulated sugar (caster) *regular white sugar works fine!

½ cup blood orange juice (freshly squeezed) + ¼ cup for glaze

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

3 eggs

1/2 plain yogurt (sour cream works well too)

1/2 cup olive oil

1 tbsp butter at room temperature

½ cup confectioner’s sugar (for glaze)

Chunky flake salt

1/4 cup crushed pistachios

Directions:

Set your oven for 350F.

Add the yogurt to the sugar and whisk together until incorporated. Add in the eggs and olive oil and continue to mix together. Add in all of the dry ingredients one by one and continue mixing. Finally whisk in the blood orange juice.

Grease your baking pan liberally with butter and line with a sheet of parchment paper and add more butter to the top of the paper. Pour the batter into your pan.

Bake for 30-35 minutes until done. If using a deeper rectangular pan, this may take 35-45 minutes. Use a toothpick to make sure it is fully cooked through. It should come out clean. Allow to cool for 15-20 minutes while you prepare your glaze.

In a small bowl add the confectioner’s sugar. Slowly begin whisking in the remaining blood orange juice little by little until it has the consistency somewhere between maple syrup and icing. A little juice goes a long way. You should be able to drizzle/pour the glaze over the cooled cake and it should begin to firm up within a few minutes. Before it fully hardens, sprinkle the flake salt all over the surface. If adding crushed pistachios, now is the time to sprinkle on a layer across the top.

Wild Violet Donuts

May 01, 2021 by Philip Buccellato in sweets, wild food, sourdough

I've been waiting for the right moment to do these wild violet sourdoughnuts. Viola sororia, known as the common blue violet, is pretty much everywhere you look right now, from the backyard to the deep woods. The flowers and leaves of this ephemeral native flower are edible and delicious. When the petals are infused with hot water it creates a vibrant hue that ranges from blue to violet. The infusion is pH sensitive and will react differently depending on how acidic or alkali the water is and can be manipulated with a drop or two of lemon juice. I made a glaze with the violet infusion which has a nice subtle floral taste and I topped them off with granulated violet sugar to give it a little texture. These were delicate, delicious and the process is incredibly fun. Video of the whole process below.

The Violet Syrup

Ingredients:

1:1:1 ratio of …

Wild violet flowers (stems removed)

Water (distilled)*

White granulated sugar

*The violet infusion is reactive to pH levels of the water. When using distilled water, the infusion will be a bright blue color. This can be manipulated by adding a few drops of lemon juice, which turns the infusion a vibrant purple/pink. But once you add the lemon, it will begin to overpower the subtle flavor of the violets.

Directions:

Bring the water to a near boil.
Mix together the hot water and violet flowers in a glass jar, stir, and allow to steep for 24 hrs. The color will gradually deepen.
Strain the flowers out using a fine mesh after 24 hrs.
Bring the infused mixture to a very low simmer and add an equal portion of white granulated sugar. Simmer on low for about ten minutes until the syrup begins to thicken. You may notice a color shift at this stage with the introduction of the sugar.
Allow to cool and store in the refrigerator until use. Will last for several months.

The Violet Sugar

Ingredients:

1:1 ratio of…

White granulated sugar

Wild violet flowers (stems removed)

Directions:

In a food processor blend together the sugar and flowers until it turns into a nice even purple sugar.
Because of the moisture in the flowers, it is best to use this sugar fresh or within a few days. Over time it will lose it’s vibrant color and will lump together in a way that becomes difficult to sprinkle.

Ingredients

230 g Manitoba 0 Flour (or similar)

25 g Whole Wheat Tumminia Flour (or similar)

40 g water

40 g sugar

50 g butter (cubed)

90 g eggs (approx 2 medium sized)

5 g salt

110 g active sourdough starter

1 tsp vanilla

Approx gallon neutral oil

*makes approximately 6 - 8 donuts depending on size

The recipe is spread out over three days and in my opinion is well worth the wait. The natural leavening always yields a tastier end result. I normally start my process around 12pm on day 1 which results in fresh donuts for breakfast two days later.

The Dough

Directions:

12 pm Day 1 - In a stand mixer, combine all your ingredients and mix for about 10 minutes.
This is very similar to a brioche dough, so at first it will feel quite sticky to the touch, even after ten minutes of mixing.
Transfer the dough to a bowl and cover.
Over the next 5-6 hours you’ll want to fold the dough with your hands 4 times. Let the dough relax for at least 30 minutes in between each fold. By the fourth fold the dough will feel a lot less sticky and will be smoother to the touch. Avoid the urge to add flour if you find it is too sticky.
6pm Day 1 - Transfer the covered bowl to the refrigerator and forget about it for 24 hrs.
6pm Day 2 - Remove dough from the refrigerator and allow to relax for about 30 minutes. Do one more round of folding and set out at room temperature overnight.
7am Day 3 - Gently flour your work surface and dump out the dough.
Bring your neutral oil up to 350F.
Use your hands to spread it out evenly. Use a rolling pin to gently roll out the dough to approximately 3/4 inch thickness. Do not press down too hard as you want to keep rise to the dough.
Using a circular cookie cutter approx 4” in diameter, punch out as many donuts as possible. Save the scraps for maltagliate - ugly leftover shapes of dough that shouldn’t go to waste!
Use another circular punch about 1/2” in diameter to punch out the holes in the center of each donut. Gently use your fingers to stretch it out ever so slightly.
Drop each circular dough into the oil and fry for about 3 minutes each side until golden brown.
Remove from the oil and set onto a rack or paper towels to dry off and cool slightly.

The Finished Donut

Ingredients:

1 cup Confectioner’s sugar

Wild violet syrup

Wild violet sugar

Flowers for garnish

Directions:

Prepare the violet glaze by mixing together about a cup of confectioner’s sugar with 1/4 cup of the wild violet syrup. Adjust accordingly so that the glaze is nice and thick, so it sticks to the donuts. Add more syrup if too thich, and add more confectioner sugar if too thin. *In a subsequent version of this I added blended flowers to the glaze which gave it nice flecks of purple color.
Once the donuts have cooled sufficiently, dip each one in the bowl of glaze and set onto a tray.
Sprinkle the violet sugar on top while the glaze is still wet so it sticks and binds together as the glaze hardens over the next few minutes.
Add a few wild violet flowers for garnish.
Enjoy.

Candy Cap Caramel Donuts

March 23, 2021 by Philip Buccellato in sweets, wild food, mushrooms

An experiment. When I first started reading about candy caps I was immediately intrigued. People always describe them in such vivid detail, emitting a perfume that smells overwhelmingly like maple syrup. A smell that saturates the room for hours. It’s one of the few mushrooms that lends itself to sweets and non-savory applications. While they don’t grow on the East Coast I was fortunate to get my hands on some from @theforagedfeast . I cycled through various ideas about what to make, read through all of @foragerchef ‘s lovely candy cap recipes and eventually circled back to something closer to home - donuts. The initial reaction might be WTF, or mushrooms don’t belong in donuts, but I assure you that these are not your average mushrooms. There might be some mental threshold that needs to be crossed for the mushroom skeptics out there, but on taste alone these are pretty special. I used a small percentage of dried candy cap powder for the dough which was naturally leavened over two days, deep fried, glazed and drizzled with a decadent salted candy cap caramel sauce. They might not end up on the menu of my hypothetical donut shop that I've been dreaming up, but they were a worthy experiment to work with some unexpected wild ingredients and produce something sweet and delicious with an incredible texture. Video of the whole process below.

Ingredients:

230 g Manitoba 0 Flour (or similar)

25 g Whole Wheat Tumminia Flour

12 g dried candy cap powder

50 g water

40 g sugar

50 g butter (cubed)

90 g eggs (approx 2 medium sized)

5 g salt

110 g active sourdough starter

1 tsp vanilla

1 gallon neutral oil

*makes approximately 6 - 8 donuts depending on size

The Dough

Directions:

12 pm Day 1 - In a stand mixer, combine all your ingredients and mix for about 10 minutes.
This is very similar to a brioche dough, so at first it will feel quite sticky to the touch, even after ten minutes of mixing.
Transfer the dough to a bowl and cover.
Over the next 5-6 hours you’ll want to fold the dough with your hands 4 times. Let the dough relax for at least 30 minutes in between each fold. By the fourth fold the dough will feel a lot less sticky and will be smoother to the touch. Avoid the urge to add flour if you find it is too sticky.
6pm Day 1 - Transfer the covered bowl to the refrigerator and forget about it for 24 hrs.
6pm Day 2 - Remove dough from the refrigerator and allow to relax for about 30 minutes. Do one more round of folding and set out at room temperature overnight.
7am Day 3 - Gently flour your work surface and dump out the dough.
Bring your neutral oil up to 350F.
Use your hands to spread it out evenly. Use a rolling pin to gently roll out the dough to approximately 3/4 inch thickness. Do not press down too hard as you want to keep some rise to the dough.
Using a circular cookie cutter approx 4” in diameter, punch out as many donuts as possible. Save the scraps for maltagliate - ugly leftover shapes of dough that shouldn’t go to waste!
Use another circular punch about 1/2” in diameter to punch out the holes in the center of each donut. Gently use your fingers to stretch it out ever so slightly.
Drop each circular dough into the oil and fry for about 3 minutes each side until golden brown.
Remove from the oil and set onto a rack or paper towels to dry off and cool slightly.

The Candy Cap Caramel

This recipe is based on a recipe from Sally McKenney.

Ingredients:

1 cup (200g) granulated sugar

6 Tablespoons (90g) unsalted, room temperature cut up into 6 pieces

1/2 cup (120ml) heavy cream, at room temperature

2 teaspoons big chunky flake salt

20g dried candy cap powder

Directions:

Bring a medium sized saucepan to medium heat and add the granulated sugar. Using a rubber spatula or whisk, stir constantly for a few minutes until the sugar eventually melts into a thick brown liquid. Continue to stir and lower the flame to a low simmer.
Once there are no more lumps, add the butter and continue stirring to combine. Whisk/stir vigorously so the sugar and butter combines without looking clumpy. This will take a few minutes.
Add the candy cap powder and continue stirring for another minute.
Very slowly pour in the heavy cream and continue stirring. It will begin to bubble as it simmers. Allow it to simmer like this for about 1 minute.
Remove from the heat and as it cools add in the flake salt.
Allow it to completely cool before using.
It will keep in the fridge for about 1 month.

The Final Donut

The donuts are then dipped in a plain glaze and drizzled with the candy cap caramel. Best enjoyed while still slightly warm.

Sourdough Sticky Buns

February 04, 2021 by Philip Buccellato in sweets

When you’re wife tells you this is one of the best things you’ve ever made, you know you’re on the right track.

Ingredients:

160 g whole milk

28 g melted butter (not hot)

1 egg

100 g active starter

24 g sugar

300 g flour (I used 00)

5 g salt

*This formula works for an approximately 7-8” round cast iron skillet/pan

For filling:

1/2 cup Brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1 Tbsp cinnamon

2 Tbsp melted butter (not hot)

For glaze & garnish:

1/2 cup Whipped cream cheese

1/2 cup Confectioner sugar

3 Tbsp Butter

Pistachios

Flake salt

This is 36 hr process that is designed for a slow ferment and planned out so you can wake and bake without any elaborate prep during the last step. The most complicated part of the process happens at night during day 2.

Directions:

9 pm day 1- Mix together all of the ingredients in a stand mixer and work the dough until smooth. About 10 minutes at high speed.
Cover and set out overnight at room temperature.
In the morning, transfer the dough into the fridge.
9 pm day 2- Take dough out of the fridge and rest for about ten minutes to loosen up a little.
Dust a work surface with flour and dump out the dough. Dust the top of the dough with more flour. Begin forming a rectangular shape with the dough then take a rolling pin to gently press it down into a uniform thickness of about 1/4 inch. Do you best to make it as rectangular and uniform as possible. Try to work quickly as the dough gets harder to work with as it warms up.
Brush on the melted butter evenly across the whole surface. Mix together the brown, white sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle on evenly across the whole surface.
Carefully take one of the long edges of the dough and start rolling up like a coil. Make sure it is tight and there are no big air pockets. You can use a bench knife and a little bit more flour if you find it sticking to the surface of your work area. Roll it tightly.
Use a sharp knife and cut the roll into medallions of equal size.
Line a cast iron skillet (or whatever baking dish you prefer) with parchment paper and drizzle in melted butter so it covers the bottom of the parchment.
Layer in the rolled dough medallions evenly. As they continue to proof they will expand and press into each other. Drizzle any extra butter all over the top of the pan, cover tightly, and return to the fridge until the morning.
6-7 am Day 3- Take the skillet out of the fridge, uncover, and let proof at room temperature for 1- 2 hrs. Set your oven to 350F.
Meanwhile, start making the glaze. Whisk together melted butter and confectioner’s sugar slowly adding the sugar. Add in the whipped cream cheese and continue to whisk together vigorously. I like to set mine on top of a double boiler to keep the glaze more workable, without the risk of burning it with direct heat. If it sits out too long at cooler temperatures it will begin to solidify.
Bake the buns for about 40 minutes until the surface is a nice golden brown.
Remove from the oven and transfer the buns to a cooling rack. As it’s cooling for about 10 minutes, drizzle on the glaze. Sprinkle with chopped pistachios and flake salt.

Vanilla Bean Panna Cotta with Wild Berries

July 29, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sweets, wild food

Vanilla bean panna cotta with wild berries was the consolation prize for the continued wait for my favorite chanterelle spot. I came home with an abundance of wineberries and blackberries which I reduced with Marsala and sugar and drizzled on top of these creamy mountains of panna cotta. Super simple summer dessert to combat the heat. Recipe as follows and video of the process below.

Ingredients

1 quart heavy cream

1 cup half and half

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 whole vanilla bean, split and scraped

2 3/4 tsp unflavored gelatin powder

3 tbsp water

1 tbsp honey

2 cups of fresh berries

1/2 cup of Marsala

1/2 cup granulated sugar

Panna Cotta Instructions

In a saucepan, combine the cream, half and half, sugar, honey, and vanilla bean (both the seeds, scraped and removed, and the entire bean itself which you’ll remove later). Bring the mixture to a low simmer. Cover, remove from heat, and set aside for 15 minutes.
Mix together the gelatin powder and the water in a small bowl while the cream steeps.
Uncover the cream and bring back to a low simmer. Remove from the heat again and add in the gelatin mixture, stirring with a whisk. Remove the vanilla bean. Allow to cool for a few minutes while you set up your ramekins, bowls, or glasses in which you will pour in the cream mixture.
Carefully ladle equal portions of the cream mixture into each container, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at minimum of 3 hours up to 24 hours. This is a good recipe to make ahead.
If you want to keep it easy, just serve the panna cotta in the bowl or glass with the berry mixture poured over the top. Or if you want a slightly fancier presentation you can remove the panna cotta by quickly lowering the ramekin into a warm bath of water, freeing the edges with a knife, and carefully flipping it oven onto the surface of your plate. It will hold it’s shape.

Berry Sauce Instructions

Bring the Marsala to a simmer in a saucepan.
Add the sugar and continue stirring for about 5 minutes.
As it begins to reduce, add in your fresh berries. I used a combination of wild blackberries and wineberries but any berry would be good for this.
Continue simmering for another 10 -15 minutes, stirring frequently, and mashing the berries to release all of their juices.
After the mixture is thickened, remove from the heat and pass it through a fine mesh sieve and reserve all of the wonderful sauce that is extracted. Allow to cool before drizzling over the top of your panna cotta with a handful of fresh berries.

Tumminia Flour Sourdough Zeppole

April 02, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sicily, sweets, sourdough

I never dared mess with my Nonna’s zeppole (sfingi) recipe but after a few weeks of shelter in place all rules are out the window. If she were here to taste the result I think she’d approve. The addition of the sourdough yeast and the Sicilian tumminia flour give the sfingi a much more distinct flavor and spongy texture which I quite like. The shell also ends up being much crispier so there is an audible crunch upon taking your first bite. They behave a little differently in the hot oil and require some manual nudging of the dough as they cook - where as in the original recipe they did all the work themselves (flipping and turning over all on their own). I also added some vanilla while I was at it. And since I already committed my crime against tradition I made a simple chocolate sauce instead of the confectioner’s sugar. These were incredible and I look forward to making them again and again.

The process is a bit more complicated and time consuming but it’s still a relatively approachable recipe.

Ingredients

80 g tumminia flour (or regular whole wheat flour)

70 g 00 Flour

50 g active starter

4 eggs

6 tbsp butter

Pinch of salt

½ tsp vanilla

1 cup of water

Zest or orange (optional)

For the sauce

½ cup of semi-sweet chocolate chunks

1 tbsp brown sugar

2 tbsp butter

Instructions

1. Bring water to a boil. Add butter, and a little bit of salt. Stir in the flour and mix thoroughly, and quickly. Remove from heat and let cool at room temperature.

2. Add the starter yeast and mix together well. Cover and set in the refrigerator overnight.

3. In the morning, take out the dough and allow to get back to room temperature so the dough begins to soften again.

4. Add eggs one at a time, mixing very well until there are no clumps of flour. Add in lemon or orange zest. Add the vanilla. The consistency should be smooth, thicker than pancake batter, but thinner than a bread dough. Let rest for a few more minutes.

5. Bring canola or peanut oil in a dutch oven or deep fryer to 350 F.

6. Using a spoon, drop globs of batter into the hot oil. This recipe will require a little extra attention than the traditional non-sourdough recipe. You’ll need to manually flip them once they are fully cooked on one side. Once fully browned and crispy, remove the zeppole with a slotted spoon and let rest in on a baking rack or in a bowl with paper towels to absorb the excess oil.

7. In a small saucepan, melt together the chocolate, butter, and sugar and simmer for a few minutes - stirring well.

5. Once the zeppole have cooled a bit, drizzle the chocolate sauce all over the top of the zeppole and enjoy.

Homemade Zeppole (Sfingi)

March 30, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sweets

Zeppole, also called sfingi in Sicily, are typically associated with celebration, whether on Christmas or St. Joseph’s Day. They’re also perfect for quarantine cooking. It is the Italians’ answer to the donut and some versions can be quite elaborate, filled with ricotta cream and topped with candied fruits. This version from my Nonna is super simple. They’re light, airy, and relatively quick and easy to make with only six common ingredients. If you don’t have 00 Flour, regular all purpose will do the trick. Watch the whole process in a fun kid hosted cooking below.

Ingredients

1 cup of 00 Flour

1 cup of water

4 eggs

6 tablespoons of butter

Lemon or orange zest

Confectioners sugar

Canola oil

1. Bring water to a boil. Add butter, and a little bit of salt. Stir in the flour and mix thoroughly, and quickly. Remove from heat and let cool at room temperature.

2. Add eggs one at a time, mixing with your hands. Add in lemon or orange zest. The consistency should be smooth, thicker than pancake batter, but thinner than a bread dough. Let rest for a few more minutes.

3. Bring canola or peanut oil in a dutch oven or deep fryer to 350 F.

4. Using a spoon, drop globs of batter into the hot oil. The trick here is to let the zeppole alone, as they begin to form a golden brown crispy shell. As they cook, they will expand, burst open, and roll over all on their own without any additional help. Once fully browned, remove the zeppole with a slotted spoon and let rest in on a baking rack or in a bowl with paper towels to absorb the excess oil.

5. Once they have cooled a bit, liberally dust with confectioners sugar and enjoy. They should be light and airy.

Whole Wheat Pancakes with Farmer Cheese

March 20, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sweets, Kids

Cooking in the time of quarantine. Stuck at home with your parents? Are you tired of your dad’s lousy old pancakes? Here’s a little video to get you through your morning. These are unusual times, but we can all get through this together! This recipe is for semi-healthy and super-tasty whole wheat pancakes. We’re using a special tumminia flour from Castelvetrano, Sicily thanks to our friends at Gustiamo - but any old whole wheat flour will do. Enjoy! Video below.

Ingredients

1/2 cup of whole wheat flour

1/2 cup of all purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tbsp brown sugar

a pinch of salt

1 tbsp melted butter

1 cup of milk

1 egg

1 cap of vanilla

1/4 cup of farmer cheese, or ricotta (optional)

Flake salt for finishing

Maple syrup

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Add the wet ingredients and mix well. Add the farmer’s cheese last and gently mix in without breaking it up too much. You want it a little chunky.

Heat up butter in a skillet (a generous amount is recommended) and cook pancakes over medium/high heat until crispy along the edges.

Finish with some nice flake salt and maple syrup. Enjoy!

Upside Down Blood Orange Olive Oil Cake

March 10, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sweets

This is a wonderful cake to make in the winter when blood oranges are at their peak. The addition of the coarse corn meal gives it a wonderful texture and flavor.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup cornmeal (coarse)

3/4 cup fine granulated sugar (caster)

3 - 4 blood oranges

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

3 eggs

1/2 plain yogurt

1/2 cup olive oil

1/3 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp water

Set your oven for 350F.

Zest one orange and mix with the sugar. Peel remaining oranges and slice thinly into medallions. Carefully remove the rind with a knife, removing as much of the pith as possible without breaking the circular forms.

Add the yogurt to the sugar and whisk together. Add in the eggs and olive oil and continue to mix together. Add in all of the dry ingredients one by one and continue mixing.

Line a circular baking pan with a sheet of parchment paper. Combine the brown sugar and water, and pour over the parchment paper, and spread it around evenly so it covers the bottom of the pan. Carefully arrange the orange medallions so they fill the entire surface of the bottom of the pan. Cut smaller wedges to fill the gaps between the circles. Pour the batter to cover the oranges.

Bake for 30-35 minutes until done. Allow to cool before serving.

Homemade Cannoli

January 04, 2020 by Philip Buccellato in sicily, sweets

My first encounter with a cannoli goes back to the 1980’s when we had large (and loud) family Sunday suppers. The older generation of grandparents, great aunts and uncles that immigrated to Brooklyn were still living and cannoli were always a key part of any large family get together. Someone would always show up with a neatly packaged box from Circo’s Bakery, tightly bound with string. On more rare occasions my Nonna would make them in her small kitchen in Bushwick, assembling them on the limited space she had on her bright orange Formica countertops.

A freshly filled cannoli is decadent in all the right ways. It’s is a sublime textural experience that I never dreamed I could create myself. The thought never even crossed my mind. There were several trips to Sicily where I’d experience some of the best cannolis I’ve ever had. And then, a few years later, as I began revisiting old family recipes and food traditions I decided it was time to give it a try. The first attempt was a disaster. The shells exploded in the hot oil and the taste wasn’t quite right. But after a lot of trial and error I arrived at a recipe that I’d be proud to share with my Nonna.

While it’s definitely not an easy or quick thing to make - great homemade cannoli can be had if you’re patient and careful about the details. The process requires a few key tools; a hand cranked or electric pasta roller, circular punch forms, and cannoli tubes (I use aluminum ones). Video about the process below.

The Cannoli Cream

Traditional cannoli cream uses a sheep’s milk ricotta which I prefer - if I can get my hands on it. Any other high fat unpasteurized milk will work. Or if you want to cut some corners or are tight on time you can start off with any decent premade ricotta. Skip the low fat stuff, you’re making cannoli.

3 cups of drained ricotta (I will be posting a recipe for this soon)

1.3 cups of confectioner’s sugar

1.5 tsp vanilla

Orange Zest

Using a hand or stand mixer, whip together these ingredients for a few minutes until well incorporated. Transfer from a bowl to a piping bag and keep in the refrigerator until ready to use.

The Shells

This is part that can easily go wrong and where you need to have a zen mindset. This recipe makes about 45 small to medium sized shells.

1.5 cups of all purpose Flour

.5 tsp cinnamon powder

1.5 tsp cocoa powder

2 tbsp white sugar

.5 tsp salt

3 tbsp cubed and chilled butter

2 tbsp Marsala

.5 tsp white vinegar

.25 cup of water

1 egg (for the wash)

Heat a neutral, high heat oil to 350F in a deep pot or fryer.
In stand mixer, combine all of the dry ingredients and mix well. Add in wet ingredients (except the egg) and continue to blend for a few minutes. Mixture will be somewhat crumbly. Remove from the bowl and pour out onto a large working surface.
Knead with your hands for 5 - 10 minutes until you have a mostly smooth and homogenous ball of dough. Wrap in plastic wrap and let rest at room temperature for 1 hour.
Remove the dough from the plastic and cut into about 5 smaller pieces. Flour the dough balls gently. Pass each ball through the pasta maker, going from the widest setting down about 6 settings. Be slow and methodical, and don’t skip any steps.
Lay each sheet of dough out on your work surface and gently flour again. Using your circular punch out form, cut circles and save all of the excess dough which you’ll use for one final pass through the pasta maker.
Carefully and tightly wrap/roll each cut circle around the cannoli tube, and seal the edge with your egg wash. Be extremely careful not to let egg get all over the place. Avoid getting the egg on the cannoli tube or the dough will end up sticking to the tube while frying. Clean up any egg that gets on your work surface.
When the oil temperature has reached 350F, drop each tube into the oil and fry until golden. Using tongs, turn the cannoli in the oil so they cook evenly. This should take only about 1 minute.
Transfer to a rack lined with paper towels and carefully slide the shells off of the tubes while it’s still hot. You’ll want to use more paper towels so you don’t burn your fingers.
The tubes should be wiped down, and chilled in the refrigerator for just 1 - 2 minutes before starting the next round of shells. This avoids a lot of mess ups.

The finishing touches

Once the shells have completely cooled you can start filling the cannoli. This is made easier as a two person task and makes for a fun family activity, but is manageable by one person if necessary. Using the piping bag, fill each shell starting with the center and working outwards. Nothing worse than a cannoli with a big empty pocket of air in the middle. Once completely filled, you can garnish with whatever you like. Traditional toppings include candied fruit, crushed pistachio, or chocolate chips. When the cannoli are all dressed up and ready to go, you can give them all a final dusting of confectioner’s sugar. They should be eaten fresh as they start to lose their textural appeal if they sit around too long and get soggy.

Nonno and Nonna in Brooklyn in the 1970’s.