The pleasant, but a little nervous bustle of New Year’s days and the noisy abundance of New Year’s Eve are replaced by peace and unhurriedness. All gifts have been distributed, all wishes have been made, all gastronomic masterpieces have been tasted – you can relax and just relax.
But the toys and garlands have not yet been removed from the Christmas tree, the Old New Year is ahead, the guests now and then look at the light, that is, the holiday continues, lasts, albeit without the previous glow. A pleasant time of non-fussy activities and reflections, when you want to cook something light, airy, unusual. And with a surprise.
My friends Orlovs these days invite guests to an Italian almond pie, or (second name) “wish fulfillment pie.” Orlovs assure that the most reliable way to achieve the fulfillment of a desire is to eat it. The idea is not new (as a child, I remember, we often ate lucky bus tickets), but improved: the desires offered to the guests by the Orlovs taste good. And delicious wishes come true much more often.
Guests with good reason feel like co-authors of the “wish fulfillment pie”, because they are trusted to make its semantic filling. Good prophecies are written on a colored piece of paper (everyone has their own color): “love will inadvertently come”; “health will get stronger”; “Expect success in everything”; “unexpected wealth will fall.” Written desires are the libretto of the future mystical action. The moment of truth will come when the guest finds a dragee in colored glaze in his piece of cake and receives a piece of paper with a desire of the same color as the candy.
Admittedly, guests are always worried. They hover around the sweet-smelling oven, peer through its glass door and send the right vibes to the cake so as not to make a mistake with the prediction. Of course, any of them will decorate life, but everyone has the most cherished.
And now the cake is ready. Our dreams are hidden under its golden crust. The guests hold out the plates with trepidation, and dreams begin to come true.
almond pie
For 4 persons. Cooking time: 1 hour 10 minutes.
For the dough: 100 g chilled butter
- 200 g flour
- 5 g sugar
- 3 egg yolks
- zest of one lemon
- 1/2 tsp salt. For the filling: 50 g peeled almonds
- 60 g sugar
- 50 g butter
- 50 g flour
- 1 egg and 1 egg yolk
- 50 g broken butter cookies
- 5-6 peaches or nectarines or plums or pears
- 2 tbsp. l. almond chips
- 2 Art. l. icing sugar
Cut the butter into cubes and mix with flour in a blender so that the mixture resembles crumbs. Add salt, sugar, yolks and zest. When the dough rolls into a ball, shape it into a log, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for an hour. Grease a pie mold with butter and sprinkle with flour. Cut the dough into thin pieces and close the bottom with them so that they slightly overlap each other. Align with an ice cube. For the walls of the pie, cut thicker pieces of dough and form the edges. Put in the refrigerator for another half hour. Grind almonds in a blender with 50 g of sugar. Add diced butter and flour, mix. The mixture should become like fine breadcrumbs. Add egg and yolk, stir until creamy. Add cookies and mix. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Dip the fruit in boiling water for a couple of seconds, transfer them to cold water. Then cut in half, remove the bones, sprinkle with 2 tbsp. l. sugar and leave for 2 minutes. Fill the form with the dough with the filling, put the fruit halves on top and sprinkle with almonds and powdered sugar. Bake until golden brown.