It's dessert time! I know, it's been almost two months since I lasted posted. Being fully vaccinated and being able to get out and do things has definitely made it harder to sit down and start writing. I better get to it, because I'm getting close to being a year behind! I made food for San Marino at the beginning of September of last year. If you're not familiar with the country, San Marino is an enclave of Italy, and one of the smallest countries in the world. It shared much of its culinary history with Italy, so it was a little difficult finding foods that were unique to this tiny nation. However, I did find the torta tre monti which represents the "Three Towers of San Marino" that sit atop the three peaks of Monte Titano in San Marino. You can order the cake from a bakery in San Marino, but I couldn't find a traditional recipe online. I mostly figured it out, as the ingredients aren't too complicated and I also found this video of them making it.
Although the bakery (obviously) makes their own waffle wafer things, I bought mine as I don't have the equipment. I think a pizzelle maker would probably work well for this. I think wafer cakes must be common in Eastern Europe; when I searched for wafers most of the results were from there. I actually still have a pack of these, as it came in a pack of two. According to the packaging in this picture, it's past what I assume is the best by date. I don't believe in expiration dates, though. So it's probably fine.
For the filling, I mixed together chocolate hazelnut spread and whipped cream (the sources I could find reference chocolate and/or hazelnut "creme" and I'm not sure exactly what that means. The video looks like it's just chocolate. The one written recipe (from another blog that did the same project as this) used nutella and whipped cream, so that's what I did. I figured it made it easier to spread as well. My whipped cream had been frozen--I think I had made it for something else previously--so that's why the texture looks strange in the above picture.
The cream definitely made it look smoother and made it easier to spread.
It was really satisfying getting the chocolate into all the little holes. Like as a kid when I would make sure my syrup filled every single divot in my waffles.
The traditional cakes are fairly thin, but probably a bit wider in circumference. I went for a slightly taller version.
The last step was adding a ring of chocolate around the edges to cover up the chocolate seeping out of the middle of the layers. I simply tempered the chocolate with butter and spread it all around with a knife. Once hardened, the chocolate held everything together and added a nice slight crunch to the texture. After sitting, the wafers softened considerably, so having another textural element really helped. I'm not sure if the traditional cake retains a crispy texture with the type of wafers they use, but I didn't mind that it softened. It certainly made cutting it very easy.
Oh yeah, did I mention there was a second part to this meal? I decided to also make piadine, which are popular in the Romagna region of Italy, which encompasses San Marino. Piadine (singular, piadina) are flatbread sandwiches commonly sold at kiosks specializing them, usually with typical sandwich fillings of meat and cheese, but you can also get sweet versions.
The flatbread dough is pretty simple. Just flour, salt, water, and fat. Lard is typical, but of course I went with olive oil which is of course commonly used in Italy. The piadina is rolled out thinly, then griddled and filled, flipping one side over the filling like a taco.
For the fillings, I went with fresh mozzarella, tomato, and spinach for myself.
Chris got a little bit of a treat and added prosciutto to his. He also added mustard, which isn't really typical but who's counting.
I added mayonnaise to mine, which surprisingly is actually typical according to the blog I got the recipe from. I'm sure there are many variations depending on where you go, so don't come for me if you think mayo is disgusting.
My flatbreads didn't come out quite as soft as I would have liked. I hid it in the pictures, but some of them actually cracked when I tried folding it over. Whoops. The mozzarella also starting leaking its liquid while I had it in the pan cooking. A better technique (if you have a soft enough dough) is to cook it lightly, then add your fillings when it's off of the heat. Lesson learned. I've made a similar dough for chapati-like flatbreads that have turned out super soft, so it could have just been the proportions in the recipe I used that made them kind of tough. They tasted good though! And they were light enough to follow them up with the rich chocolatey cake for dessert.
Recipes Used: Torta Tre Monti // Piadina
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