Italian Strawberry Crostata; sweet and tangy strawberry preserve encased in a classic buttery shortcrust pastry.
Living with someone who works in the food industry has its perks.
Occasional cheeky free lunches, contacts within the industry, and of course those times when they come home with a full 2 kilogram tub of strawberry jam that needs to be used up ASAP…
A daunting task for any baker, even those like me who love a bit of jam, though I imagine one that a few of us may be facing after a hot summer and glut of fresh berries. My eyes were trying to fathom just how many slices of toast I would need to consume to get through it all. My brain buzzed with British classics like trifles, Victoria sponges and Bakewell tarts in an attempt to handle this heavy load. Thankfully, my Venetian other half had an immediate suggestion: Italian Strawberry Crostata.
(Cut to me quietly and quickly Googling just what the heckity heck a crostata was.)
A crostata (also known elsewhere in the country as coppi or sfogliate) is an Italian baked tart or pie. It has been seen around Northern Italy for hundreds of years, though still seen made today using fruit preserves and shortcrust pastry. I had heard of this Mediterranean dessert before but had never had the chance to bake or taste it. Thankfully, it served as the perfect way to use up a sticky fraction of the strawberry jam!
This rustic but pretty Italian Strawberry Crostata consists of a sweet but sharp lemon-laced strawberry filling enveloped in the shortest, butteriest, melt-in-the-mouthiest pastry. It’s an ideal treat after dinner, maybe served with a little bit of cream. It also makes a lovely breakfast, stuffed greedily from hand to hungry mouth.
Pastry may seem a bit scary to novice bakers, but I assure you this recipe is wonderfully simple. This Italian Strawberry Crostata only requires 6 ingredients and very little hands-on time. Once the pastry is made, shaped, and sliced, all you have to do is a quick bit of stirring and then it’s just a case of letting the oven do the rest of the work.
To make this Italian Strawberry Crostata, simply follow the recipe below!
Italian Strawberry Crostata
Notes
BE A MAVERICK: use whatever kind of jam or preserve you like in the filling!
Ingredients
For the shortcrust pastry:
- 300g plain flour
- 175g cold salted butter, cut into cubes
- 2 tbsp icing sugar
- 2 egg yolks
For the strawberry filling:
- 200g-300g strawberry jam or preserve
- Zest of ½ a lemon
Instructions
For the shortcrust pastry:
- In a large bowl or food processor, weigh out your flour, butter and icing sugar.
- In the bowl/food processor, use a knife (or the blitz setting on the food processor) to chop your cubed butter into small pea-sized pieces.
- Use your fingers (or, again, the blitz setting on the food processor) to rub your tiny butter pieces into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
- Add the egg yolks along with 2 tbsp of cold water and work the mixture gently into a smooth dough. Feel free to add more flour or water if the dough feels too sticky or too dry.
- Tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface.
- Use a rolling pin to roll it out into a flat disc around the thickness of a £1 coin (⅛ of an inch).
- Roll the dough gently around your rolling pin in a spiral, and unroll it over the top of your tin.
- Gently press and pinch the dough into all the nooks and crannies of your tin, cutting any excess overhang from the edges.
- Chill the pastry case in the fridge for 15-20 minutes while you cut your lattice strips.
- Roll out any remaining pastry into a disc roughly the same thickness and diameter as your pastry case was.
- Use a sharp knife or ridged rolling cutter to slice even strips of dough as narrowly or widely as you like. Try to use up as much of the pastry as you can for this, you may not need all the strips but it’s always better to have too many than too few!
- Once you have a selection of strips, set them aside while you fill the pastry case.
For the strawberry filling:
- Spoon your jam/preserve into a large bowl.
- Grate in the lemon zest and give it all a good stir. This will not only combine the zest with the jam/preserve but will also get rid of any big gelatinous lumps in the mixture.
- Pour the mixture into your chilled pastry case and smooth it out.
- Lay the strips of pastry over the filling in parallel lines, weaving each one under and over one another to create a lattice.
- Chill the assembled crostata in the fridge for a further 15 minutes while you preheat your oven – 180 C / 160 C fan / 350 F / gas mark 4.
- Bake the chilled crostata in your preheated oven for 40 minutes or until the pastry is golden and the jam/preserve is bubbling and thickened slightly.
- Allow the crostata to cool completely before dusting with icing sugar, slicing and serving with a cup of strong coffee.
- Buon appetito!
