Torta della Nonna

I have a thing for Italian cuisine. I’m always curious to learn more about Italian food and to try out new recipes. With my sweet tooth of course, I love Italian desserts and pastry :-)

Here's a cake that I had on my "to bake"-list. As you can see, it’s got ricotta in it… Have I mentioned already that I can’t get enough of it at the moment? ;-) Also, it’s made with a lot of marzipan which I looove as well. But with marzpian it’s always the same thing - either you totally like it, or you absolutely don’t. So for all of you who hate it, you can stop reading now. All of you who love it, this cake is delicious!


Torta della Nonna

150g soft butter
300g marzipan paste, ground
6 eggs
250g ricotta
ground zest of 1 lemon
ground zest of 1 orange
1 bitter almond, ground (I used a few drops of bitter almond aroma)
30g flour
butter and ground almond slices for the baking tin
pine nuts and icing sugar

Preheat oven to 175°C.

Beat butter and marzipan with a hand mixer until creamy. Mix in one egg after the other. Then, add ricotta, lemon and orange zest and a little bitter almond aroma. Then, add flour and mix with a ladle.

Grease round baking tin (24 cm diameter) with butter and sprinkle it with the ground almond slices. Then, pour in the batter and sprinkle some pine nuts onto it.

Bake in the middle of the oven for about 25 – 30 minutes. Check whether it’s done with a wooden skewer. (with my oven, it took a little longer)

Dust with icing sugar before serving.

(from: Leila Lindholm - A Piece of Cake)

This is one of these cakes which probably even gets better after beeing kept in the fridge for a while.