Maltese Figolli ~ An Easter Tradition

Every Easter when we were young, Mum used to make these lovely almond pastries which were like gingerbread shapes filled with almond paste. She made several of these and we always got to chose a shape we liked...I used to love having a mermaid or an Easter basket or a fish, also a heart...other shapes included a butterfly, a lamb or a car or even the shape of a man or woman. Sometimes we would come up with a new shape and make the patterns ourselves.

Each figolla once baked would be decorated with glace icing and an Easter egg. These were very large pastries and used to last several days especially that we each had our own!

Here is the recipe:

For the pastry:
175 grams caster sugar
400 grams plain flour, sifted
200 grams butter
Grated rind of 1/2 lemon
2 egg yolks, beaten

A little water

For the almond paste:
300 g caster or icing sugar

A few drops orange flower water (or almond essence if you can't find the Orange flower water)
Grated rind of 1/2 lemon
300 grams almonds, ground

2 egg whites

To finish:
Glacé icing (200g icing sugar + 2 tblspoons warm water)
Royal icing (optional)
Small Easter eggs

This recipe will make about 4 figolli depending on the size of the patterns used and the thickness of each rolled out shape.

Directions
Make the pastry by first sieving the flour in a large bowl, then rubbing in the butter until the mixture resembles fine crumbs.

Add the sugar and the grated lemon rind and bind with the yolks, mixing with a little water to make a fairly pliable dough. Leave to chill.

To make the almond paste add the sugar, orange flower water and lemon rind to the ground almonds, and bind with the egg whites.
Roll out the pastry and cut out in the shapes you have chosen.

Make two of each shape as these will be sandwiched with almond paste.
Lay the first shape on a greased and floured baking tray, spread with almond paste, leaving a small margin.
Lay the second shape over the top and press the edges together.
It helps if you wet the edges with a pastry brush to ensure the pastry seals well.

Repeat with the rest of the shapes so that each pastry will have two shapes sandwiched with a layer of almond paste.

Bake at 200'C/400'F/gas 6 for 5 minutes, then at 180'C/350'F/gas 4, for about 20 minutes, until pale golden. I would say a moderate oven, make sure they don't burn as the last minutes are crucial to the end result. It is not the first time I had to scrape the bottom of a couple of shapes!

(For those whose ovens cook very rapidly I suggest you put a pan of cold water on the shelf underneath the shelf with your pastries.)

Let cool on the tray.
When the pastries are thoroughly cold, spread a coat of glacé icing and decorate with royal icing in a different colour to define the pattern chosen.

While the icing is still soft, press a small, foil-wrapped Easter egg in the middle of each shape.

Variation

Instead of making several shapes you could roll out half of the pastry mixture and place onto your greased and floured baking pan, making sure it does not touch the sides.

Cover with the almond filling and again roll the rest of the pastry to cover. Seal by wetting the edges with a pastry brush, keeping away from the sides of the pan. This will make one large pastry the shape of your pan. Once cold again decorate with icing or chocolate and cut into squares.

If you have the patience to make these, try making many small figolli using your favourite cookie cutters. If any of you try making the figolli in any shape or size, send me pictures and I will feature them on my blog : )

Footnotes: When rolling out the pastry make sure you use plenty of flour so that it does not stick to the surface.

Since I have had enquiries about where to buy the figolli shapes, I thought I had best post about it here. You can look in the baking section of most supermarkets. You could also make your own by cutting out templates from cardboard and then using them to cut around as you place them on the rolled out dough. Another idea is to re-cycle those empty plastic boxes of chocolate that come in the shape of hearts or stars to use as large cutters.

The filling should be spread on the pastry about 1cm thick.

If you want to make larger quantities, you can of course double the ingredients.

For those watching their diet, you can use less sugar in the pastry. If you double the pastry, do not use more than 200g sugar and 3 medium egg yolks will be enough to bind.

Enjoy!

Pictures are from from my files