The Crostata Cake is one of the most common Italian cakes, even if you have never seen it in your country: we eat as sweet at the end of lunch or dinner, like a snack in the afternoon or for breakfast in the morning with coffee, latte or cappucino.
It is not easy to trace the origin of the crostata cake, but we can certainly define it as one of the oldest sweets in the peninsula.
The cake is the classic among grandmother and pastry desserts. Dessert suitable for any occasion can be transformed into a thousand different cakes depending on the filling: fruit tart, chocolate, custard or apple.
It seems that it can even be traced back to the pre-Christian era, becoming the oldest dessert in the Italian pastry tradition.
As in many stories, the origin creates the myth or popular belief and on the crostata cake, there have been different interpretations of what was the beginning and the birth of this dessert. Certainly, its origins fall in the history of savory pies.
We have to wait until the year one thousand to find in Venice a recipe for the sweet with cane sugar that came from the Middle East. So who is the inventor of this cake? Many attribute the invention to a nun from the convent of San Gregorio Armeno. It is said that the strips of shortcrust pastry on the surface of the cake recall the grates with which the cloistered nuns attended religious services.
National Crostata Cake
The 9th of September is the official national crostata cake day. To celebrate, some italian people still prepare the crostata cake by hand to then eat it and share it with their loved ones. There is a sense of tradition and magic when preparing food by hand.
It’s a process that contains a kind of magic that is hard to explain. The process could be associated to anything worthwhile having in this life. To have amazing things, you need to out in the work add the “ingredients” and actions necessary to have it. Time, effort and passion are very important and if you add love to it…Something amamazing truly comes out of this alchemy process.
How amazing is it that with the same ingredients, but in different portions, we can create different kinds of cake? Crostata is a very special one, its pastry melts in your mouth as soon as it touhes your tongue and the jam, that could be apricot, plum, wood fruits, cherry, apple or even chocolate, mixes perfectly with it…Creating an amazing combination of genuine ingredients, deliciousess, care and joy of shareing it with others.
Curiosity on the Crostata Cake
It is said that the tart managed to make Queen Maria Theresa of Austria smile, wife of Ferdinand II, who was called “the queen who never smiles”.
Did you know? Since then, the success of the tart has produced countless variations even if the real undisputed star of this dessert will always remain the shortcrust pastry.
From now on, when you taste a slice of tart, you’ll be reminder of this story and of course you won’t be able to help yourself but to smile. This dessert also got a dedicated national day: 9 September, the day when the goodness, crispness and joy of the tart are celebrated
