Ciao, ribelli.
Gangster media is a staple of American pop culture. Everybody knows about The Sopranos, The Godfather and Goodfellas.
Sometimes we sympathize with Mob characters or fantasize about being in their
shoes. They have just about every status symbol- money, power, and ways of
showing their money and power. Plus people have a morbid fascination with
crime.
But at the end of the day, we don't want to catch ourselves thinking we like the Mafia. In real life, they're real trouble. And forget about joining them- even the movies can tell you it's not a good idea.
The victims are real, but in Sicily, they're taking a stand.
Addiopizzo (or "Goodbye Pizzo"), is
a nonprofit organization based in Sicily. They have a
travel service and an
online store.
They partner with local businesses that refuse to pay the pizzo, or protection racket money. Through Addiopizzo, Sicilians and tourists can support businesses without supporting the Mafia.
Some of their other goals include lowering unemployment rates, particularly
for women, and eliminating stereotypes about Sicilian businesses. Here's a
translation of their "Who We Are" page, if you want to look at it. The original can be found
here.
It's not often that Americans stumble upon information like this, so you may
be wondering how I got here.
As with many good things, I found it while researching for something else.
I was writing a short story about a boy detective and a Girl Scout cookie racket. I didn't know where to begin on the organized crime side of things, so naturally I looked to Wikipedia for inspiration.
That's when I found Addiopizzo. I took a passing interest initially, but last year I was bitten by the Italian bug. I obsessed over the language, the cuisine, and the music. I often visited Addipizzo Store hoping to learn Italian through immersion.
It didn't work as well as Duolingo, but I wasn't going in blind, either. There was at least one word I understood.
Biscotti.
Cookies, biscuits, whatever your preferred translation. Biscotti aren't just cantucci (or cantuccini if they're smaller), as I briefly mentioned in my Acorn Biscotti article.
Today, though, I'm interested in frollini, or Italian shortbread cookies.
Frollini are biscotti made from pasta frolla, which is often translated to "shortcrust dough". Which, you know. Shortbread.
Most of the time, frollini are flavored with citrus zest and/or spices. From
my experience making them, they're not worth it without the citrus.
Cotti in Fragranza, one of many businesses partnered with Addiopizzo, sells two types of frollini through Addiopizzo Store: Buonicuore and Parrapicca.
Buoni cuore means "good hearts", and parra picca is a Sicilian
saying that "refers to the classic person who never stops talking and works
little", according to an
app description I found when
Reverso Context couldn't tell me. The strange places I get information, I'm
tellin' ya.
Cotti in Fragranza is actually another nonprofit, based in the Malaspina juvenile detention facility in Palermo.
The goal is to teach the inmates valuable business skills and help them
reintegrate into society. They're responsible for every stage in production,
from baking to packaging and marketing. Once again, here's their about page
and the
English translation.
Their products boast ingredients like maiorca flour, muscovado sugar, "zero
kilometer" (local) milk and eggs, and organic ginger. Some or all of their
zero kilometer ingredients are grown on land confiscated from the mafia.
Alright, so how do we help? Can we Americans buy delicious frollini to support this really cool bakery and possibly help take down the Mob?
Well yes, but actually no.
I tried to order some frollini from Addiopizzo, only to get a refund and an email saying tee shirts are the only products they ship to the US.
I was not to be deterred... immediately.
I found another website called Tierra e Cielo, meaning either Earth and Sky or Earth and Heaven. They sell Buonicuore, Parrapicca, and a third kind not mentioned on the Addiopizzo store, Coccitacca.
Reverso says "cocci" means pieces or shards and "tacca" means a nick, scratch, indentation or whatever.
I assume cocci refers to the pieces of dark chocolate, and tacca refers to the fact that these cookies have larger cracks than the others. Still kinda weird, though.
Turns out Tierra e Cielo does ship to the US. Problem solved, right?
Well, no. While I technically "could" get the cookies from there, the shipping price is over 75 Euros, which converts to around $85 USD as I write this.
SHAMELESS PLUG
Now might be a good time to mention The Rebel Palate's new Patreon page.
So far there's only one tier, at $3 USD. My hope is that
literally any funding at all will help me make better content,
especially with beta reading.
And yes, there will be more tiers. I just need to figure out what those are first. All tiers will allow patrons to beta-read posts before they go up.
I'm using Patreon because I hate ads as much as you do, except I'm not one of those people who just says that and uses ads anyway.
I also want to get a job in spring, so I'm not begging. You're just allowed to help me now.
SHAMELESS PLUG OVER
So what do I do now?
I don't think I mentioned it, but when I went on The Quest For The Biggy Iggy I was fully prepared to re-create it using what little I knew about it.
Guess what I'm gonna do?
That's right. While I wait for a more reasonable way to buy Buonicuore et
al., I want to make a bootleg version.
I don't expect accuracy, but how am I gonna know?
INGREDIENTS
Cotti in Fragranza uses fancy, expensive, natural ingredients. I would do this, but I'm not sure I can find all the right ingredients on time for my post deadline.
The protein content of the flour is important for texture. The original frollini use maiorca flour, which is an "ancient Sicilian soft-grain wheat". Since it has less gluten than regular flour, it's supposed to be softer and easier to digest.
I wish I could find a percentage on maiorca's protein content, but nobody
seems to know. I thought I could use that to match the protein content, but
I can't, and I'll have to deal with it.
I would use cake flour, because it's also relatively low-protein, but I don't have that either.
Are we hosed? Not necessarily.
You can't "make" cake flour, because real cake flour is one ingredient (finely ground soft wheat), but you can cut the protein using cornstarch. I found a recipe that uses two tablespoons of cornstarch for every cup of flour.
That doesn't sound like it would make a difference, but I have to try it. And at least this way I can use whole wheat flour.
Muscovado sugar is like dark brown sugar, only darker. It uses a process
that leaves more molasses intact, and it has a more complex flavor. I'm
personally content with adding molasses to white sugar.
The other ingredients are pretty normal: Milk, eggs, butter, citrus zest, and yeast.
The yeast initially struck me as odd, because most frolla recipes use
baking powder as leavening, if any. But apparently Cotti in Fragranza use
organic yeast in their cookies.
ATTEMPT #1
My first attempt came with a much earlier draft of this post. These are the ones I really messed up on.
Based on the ingredients in the originals, I think they're supposed to have more air bubbles than most frollini.
These pictures from Cotti in Fragranza show the textures really well.
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Buonicuore. Image credit: Cotti in Fragranza. |
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Coccitacca. Image credit: Cotti in Fragranza. |
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Parrapicca. Image credit: Cotti in Fragranza. |
I messed up in two ways, as far as I can tell: I forgot the yeast until the last minute, and I didn't use enough milk. I also didn't bake them for long enough, which made them a little chewy on the inside.
ATTEMPT #1.5
The yeast is important, but what makes me say I didn't use enough milk?
Weeks after Attempt #1, I kinda just felt like making more frollini. It wasn't a "real" attempt, hence the point-five.
The dough was dry and unworkable, so I overcompensated with water.
It was still a serviceable dough, so I continued as normal. The frollini
came out surprisingly puffy.
That's when I realized, maybe the water created pockets of vapor while the frollini were in the oven.
ATTEMPT #2
Knowing this, I doubled the amount of milk I used from Attempt #1. The dough was relatively moist, unlike most frolla dough which is hard and crumbly. With most recipes, you have to pack it together.
This time, my mistake was once again that I almost forgot the yeast.
It took a long time to bake these to the right consistency because they're so dense. I kept putting them in the oven again and again for 10 minute, then 20 minute intervals, but ultimately I let them sit in there overnight while the oven cooled off.
The next morning they were... cooked through, anyway. Hard to bite into, but easy to chew with a crumbly (not gritty!) texture. I daresay almost flaky.
Given that I messed up with the yeast, these were surprisingly close to the
result I wanted. It's still not a good result, I'm just saying
they're not complete rocks.
I noticed the official pictures showed some coarse Dunkin' Blueberry
Muffin-looking sugar on the cookies, so I used granulated sugar. Except I
kind of encrusted mine with sugar, which may have been a bad move.
As for flavor, I was pretty disappointed. I guess the orange zest oxidized
from the heat or being left out all night, making it stale at best.
That and I didn't have enough chocolate. Two ounces of chocolate seem good
for a full batch, but I had barely one and a half.
ATTEMPT #3
This time I made sure to add the yeast with the liquid ingredients so it could get a head start on eating the sugar.
It started bubbling right as I was about to add the flour, which I took as a promising sign.
Except I messed up on the flour by adding 2 tablespoons of cornstarch instead of 4. I forgot I was working with two cups of flour.
I was also out of chocolate and almost out of orange zest, so I didn't
anticipate liking these very much.
I sprinkled the granulated sugar on top of these ones.
I also cut them into smaller cubes, about 3/4 of an inch instead of 1 inch.
I baked them for 50 minutes and they turned out with the right texture.
THE RECIPE
Now for our featured presentation.
Here's the recipe I've come up with based on all publicly available information on Cotti in Fragranza's frollini, frolla recipes I found online, and experience from my past attempts:
- 2 cups flour (Maiorca or 00 preferred- add 4 Tbsp cornstarch for regular
flour)
- 1 stick butter
- ½ cup dark brown sugar (Muscovado preferred)
- ¼ cup milk
- 1 egg
Flavorings (explained in Step 2)
¼ tsp yeast
1. READ ALL THE INSTRUCTIONS FIRST.
2. Using a pastry blender, cut the sugar into the butter.
If you don't have a pastry blender you can use an electric mixer, but
do it in short bursts so the butter doesn't heat up. The goal is to
keep the butter from softening so you get a granular texture. I went the
extra mile and chilled my bowl and pastry blender in the fridge before I
started.
Add egg and milk and continue mixing. This is where you should add the yeast so it actually does something.
3. Sift flour into the bowl and stir it in using a rubber spatula. This is where you'll add your flavorings.
For Attempt #1, this is where I split the dough to add the flavorings for Parrapicca and Coccitacca.
Below are the amounts I used for a HALF batch of each cookie, so double
them for a full batch.
For Parrapica I used the zest of half a
lemon with a teaspoon of ginger, which made it spicy but not too much for my
taste. You can use less ginger, because I don’t know if they’re supposed to
be “spicy” so much as ginger-scented. I just don’t recommend going over two
teaspoons for a full batch.
For Coccitacca I used the zest of
half an orange and about an ounce of dark chocolate. If you want to make
this one, chop the chocolate into very fine pieces or use semi-sweet mini chips.
You need the chocolate in small pieces so you can roll the dough
evenly.
Note that Coccitacca's description on Tierra e Cielo says it uses "cold-worked dark chocolate", which I'm guessing means "fancy European chocolate".
I didn't make Buonicuore, but if I did, I would use the zest of one mandarin orange and nothing else. Which is boring. That's why I didn't do it.
4. Pack all of the dough together, however crumbly, until it becomes uniform and smooth. Remember to use your hands as little as possible so the butter in the dough doesn't soften.
If you really want to use your hands, you can probably dip them in ice
water intermittently, but I doubt you actually want to. You may want to use
whatever non-hand utensils you have.
5. Roll the dough on a piece
of parchment paper on a smooth, hard surface. You want the dough to be
pretty thick, which I'll explain in Step 6.
Put the parchment paper with the dough onto a cookie sheet.
6. I
put the dough straight in the fridge the first time, but the yeast didn't do
anything. I recommend covering the dough and leaving it out to rise for 30
minutes first.
After that, you’ll have to find room in your fridge to chill the dough.
Cotti in Fragranza chills the dough at 2°- 6° C (~35°- 42°F) for 24 hours. I
don’t know why the specific temperature range is important, because it’s
just the temperature of a fridge, but it means we have nothing to worry
about.
The idea behind chilling the dough is that it’ll cut
cleanly, and slow the formation of gluten. Though that idea might be shot by
letting it rise.
7. Take the trays of dough out of the fridge.
Cotti in Fragranza's frollini are cut in cubes, or anyway really thick
squares. This is why you want the dough to be thick.
Use a non-serrated knife to cut the dough into near-cube shapes.
8. Bake at 330°F (165°C) for 50 minutes.
If you're uncomfortable baking them for that long, I don't blame you. You can do it trial-by-error like I did in Attempt #2, but it might be frustrating.
After taking them out of the oven, flip the cookies over and let them cool on the pan.
CONCLUSION
Despite my struggles, I thoroughly enjoyed writing this post. Even though Reverso Context did everything for me, translating the store pages made me feel like a detective.
Speaking of detectives, don't ask about that story I mentioned earlier. It's been in the trash for at least two years, and for good reason. Something may come of that universe and its characters, though I can't make any promises.
Today's recommended song is Comu si Beddra by Angelo Daddelli & i Picciotti!
Angelo Daddelli & i Picciotti is one of the music groups partnered with Addiopizzo. "I Picciotti" means "The Made Guys". As in mob made guys.
Comu si Beddra is my favorite song from their absolute one album. I like the tarantella sound and the rapid-fire lyrics. I only wish I knew it was about.
The album's Bandcamp description says it's "the original ballad that tells the courtship in its simplest manifestation", but that's all I know. There are no written lyrics on the Internet, let alone translations.
Beh. Rimanete bei!
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