Crostata: Italian Apple Pie with Shortcrust Pastry
A simple Italian crostata is almost a dessert pizza: a thin layer of shortcrust pastry topped with jam or fruit and covered with a lattice of pastry strips. It is baked in a round tin with a fluted edge, and the name itself, crostata, most likely comes from crosta, meaning crust, which describes the pie well: it looks like a thin shortcrust “chip” with jam on top.
The crostata recipe is simple and straightforward. The whole point is a thin shortcrust base pressed into a large tin with a rim, like an apple pie. Then, depending on your mood, you add fresh or stewed fruit, ricotta or a nut cream, or spread it with jam, and finish with the special charm of a lattice of narrow dough strips. All that is left is to bake it and enjoy.
It looks very much like the Neapolitan pastiera, an Easter Eve treat and a symbol of rebirth, though you can often find it on any other day too. It is made with ricotta, eggs and wheat flour and decorated with candied fruit. Or like the French tarte, a similar open pie made with shortcrust pastry, which, by the way, is made in many inventive ways, sometimes even with barbecue.
The base of a crostata is shortcrust pastry, pasta frolla (brisée). It is dense but tender. It contains quite a lot of butter or margarine and is very high in calories. If you need to, this dough keeps well in the freezer for a long time. It is ideal for shortbread cookies, tart bases or cream baskets.
The filling for a crostata can be very varied, although I like best apples stewed with sugar and spices, the way they are prepared for strudel filling.
You can make the shortcrust pastry with butter or margarine, as you prefer. The whole process splits into making the pastry base, which can be done the day before, and the actual baking. This way it all happens unhurriedly, and the result is excellent. The advantage of preparing the dough ahead is that you can always use it when it suits you, and baking the pie itself takes very little time.
Ingredients
6-8 servings
- Flour 3 cups (390 g)
- Eggs 2
- Margarine 150 g
- White sugar 1 cup (180 g)
- Brown sugar 4 tbsp (55 g)
- Green apples 4-5
- Starch 2 tbsp (20 g)
- Butter 30 g
- Salt, nutmeg, vanilla, cinnamon, Cointreau liqueur, lemon juice to taste
Step-by-step recipe
Shortcrust pastry needs to rest in the cold for at least 1 hour. More conveniently, you can make it the day before and bake the next day. Take the margarine and eggs out of the fridge in advance so the margarine softens. In a large bowl, combine 2 cups of sifted flour (260 g), the margarine chopped with a knife (you can chop it right in the bowl), one egg yolk and one more whole egg.
Add a pinch of fine salt and a little ground nutmeg, a quarter of a teaspoon is enough. Set aside a full 1 tbsp of sugar (14 g) for the filling and mix the rest into the flour. Squeeze in some lemon juice to taste.
It is convenient to knead the dough in a stand mixer with spiral attachments. Chop the margarine with a knife, then mix all the ingredients thoroughly with the mixer.
Dust the table with flour and turn the dough out onto it. Knead by hand, adding flour. The mixture should become smooth and firm. Keep adding flour until the dough stops sticking to your hands. Roll it into a ball and wrap it in plastic wrap. Put the parcel in the fridge, preferably in the cooler compartment. The dough should rest for 1 hour, or even longer if possible.
For the pie it is best to use tart green apples, such as Simirenko. The sugar provides the sweetness, and it is better to get the acidity naturally from the apples. This variety is also quite firm, so the slices keep their shape during cooking.
Peel the apples and remove the seeds. Cut them into slices about 1 cm thick. You can stew the apples in a saucepan or a frying pan. Melt 1 tbsp of butter, add 1 tbsp of white sugar (14 g) and 4 tbsp of brown sugar (55 g), 1 tsp of ground cinnamon (3 g) and 1-2 tbsp of Cointreau liqueur. Heat over low heat until the sugar dissolves.
Put the apple slices into the hot syrup, stir and stew covered for 10 mins. Apples release juice, but a pie filling should not be runny, so add 1-2 tbsp of starch (10–20 g) to the apples to bind the excess liquid and make the filling firm.
Take the dough wrapped in plastic out of the fridge. Throw away the wrap, knead the dough briefly by hand and divide it into two parts, roughly 2 to 3. Use the larger part for the base and the smaller for the strips that form the characteristic lattice on the pie.
You will need a large round baking tin, preferably with fluted sides. Since the dough contains a lot of fat, there is no need to grease the tin with extra butter. Press the larger piece of dough into the tin, filling all the ridges on its sides. The layer will be quite thin, literally 5-6 mm.
Leaving a 2-3 cm gap from the sides, arrange all the apples on the dough. Start at the edge and lay them in a circle, then move closer to the centre, and so on. Don’t pile the filling up too much, but the apples should lie tightly with no gaps.
Knead the smaller piece of dough by hand and roll it out thinly with a rolling pin. With an ordinary knife or a pizza wheel, cut the thin sheet into strips 20-25 mm wide. Be careful: the strips are thin and tear very easily. Lay the strips one by one over the filling in a mesh or lattice. Lay one more strip around the edge along the side, pressing it lightly with your fingers. You should get a roll of dough around the rim.
Preheat the oven to 210-220°C. A crostata bakes very quickly, usually in 20-25 mins. Keep an eye on it to make sure the surface does not start to burn.
Let the pie cool. Cut it right in the tin without taking it out. The shortcrust base is very brittle and you most likely won’t be able to lift the whole pie out. Cut it into 6-8 pieces, like a pizza. Use a spatula to put the slices onto dessert plates.
Apple crostata is delicious even without a drink, just as a treat. If you like, serve it with tea or cocoa with milk, which is simply indescribable!
Calories and macros
705 kcal
Serving ≈ 240 g
- Protein9 g5% of kcal
- Fat27 g35% of kcal
- Carbs103 g60% of kcal
100 g293 kcalProtein 3.8 gFat 11 gCarbs 42.9 g
Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.
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