Listen up. Forget hamantaschen for Purim. This year why not try Italian-style ‘Haman’s ears’ for your holiday treat?
Food writer Silvia Nacamulli has relished the regional favourite she’s known since childhood as orecchie di Amman – fried strips of pastry flavoured with orange zest and a pinch of cinnamon.
She tells the JC: “For Italian Jews, these are synonymous with Purim much like hamantaschen are for Ashkenazim. The shape and recipe may vary slightly by region or household – some use alcohol, others don’t – but the idea of simple fried pastry is consistent.”
The Rome-born Jewish cookery writer explains the dish is a variation of fried pastries known “frappe”, “chiacchiere” or cenci” which are eaten at carnivals which take place across Italy in the weeks before Lent.
Nacamulli explains: “The main difference in the recipe is the use of oil, rather than butter as in the carnival versions – probably connected with kashrut in order to make them parev.”
She adds “Purim has been often referred as ‘the Carnival of the Jews’, mostly for the similar tradition of dressing up.”
A plate of Silvia Nacamulli's traditional orecchie di Amman (Picture: Jennifer Balcombe)[Missing Credit]
Italian-Jewish Purim food is largely bite-sized, sweet and frequently features almonds and marzipan. A good many recipes include alcohol too, meaning that many can fulfil two of the Purim mitzvot – drinking for joy and giving of mishloach manot (gifts of ready-to-eat food).
One favourite recipe Nacamulli makes for her family every year is buricche, an empanada-like pastry parcel from Ferrara, a city between Bologna and Venice in Italy’s Emilia-Romagna region. “The sweet version has an almond filling, though I enjoy making the savoury versions with minced meat, a vegetarian filling of aubergines and tomato, or my favourite, tuna, olives and capers.”
The author of Jewish Flavours of Italy: A Family Cookbook, Nacamulli has been contributing recipes to the JC since 2007. She says: “I think I have counted almost 250 recipes now, so I have to be inventive a lot.”
A tray of buricche – one of Silvia Nacamulli's favourite Purim recipes (Picture: Silvia Nacamulli)[Missing Credit]
Having lived in the UK since she arrived in 1998 to study at the London School of Economics, Nacamulli remains proud of her Italian-Jewish heritage.
She says: “Italian Jews are the oldest Jewish community in the Western world, and have been there for over 2,000 years so they’re very Jewish and very Italian at the same time.”
Her family roots in Rome go back 15 or 16 generations on her mother’s side, she says. Growing up, she assumed eating orecchie di Amman at Purim and other regionals customs were the norm. After spending time studying in Israel in her 20s she soon understood the unique nature of her original home community.
Explaining that the correct term for Italian Jews is ‘Italkim’, she says: “Because Jews have been in Italy for so long, before the split into Ashkenazi and Sephardi, we’re actually neither, so we fall into a unique gap.”
Silvia Nacamulli getting into the Purim spirit[Missing Credit]
“Food has always played a very central role” in her life, and Nacamulli uses the term “inventive thrift” describe the spirit of Italian-Jewish cuisine – “using parts of food that others would throw away.” For example, one dish from Venice uses the strings and ends removed when shelling peas.
Jewish-Roman food features lots of “small, bony fish” such as anchovies due to restrictions placed on the community after a Papal bull was issued in 1555 to ‘incentivise’ Jews to convert to Christianity. The resultant dictats included restrictions on which fish the community was allowed to eat.
Jewish-Italian food is highly regional, and Nacamulli says her research has thrown up countless half-forgotten recipes for Purim treats from smaller communities around the country, including a handful of “small, little biscuits” recorded by the food writer Edda Servi Machlin, who was born in the hill town of Pitigliano in Tuscany.
Silvia Nacamulli's book is full of Italian-Jewish recipes (Picture: Pen & Sword)[Missing Credit]
Next week, Nacamulli will be demonstrating three recipes – including orecchie di Amman –during a talk she is giving on Italian Purim food for Jewish Book Week, and is looking forward to sharing some of her favourite festive traditions with a wider audience. “I am an Italian, Jewish mama, so I like to feed and to share stories.”
Learn about – and taste – the savoury and sweet delicacies of Silvia Nacumulli’s Italian Purim at her Jewish Book Week demonstrations – 12:00pm & 6:30pm, Tuesday 3 March
Silvia Nacamulli’s orecchie di Amman recipe
Prep: 15 minutes, plus 15-20 minutes resting time
Cook: 10 minutes
Makes: 20 - 25 pieces
INGREDIENTS
For the pastry:
- 1 egg large
- 50 grams sugar
- Grated orange peel from one orange
- 1 pinch cinnamon (optional)
- 40 ml sunflower oil
- 1 pinch sea salt
- 170 grams flour plus extra for dusting
- 500 ml sunflower oil or other neutral oil for frying
- Confectioner's sugar for dusting
METHOD
- In a bowl, gently whisk the egg with the sugar, orange zest, cinnamon, oil and a pinch of salt. Add the flour and mix again, working the dough by hand or in a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment. The consistency should be soft and malleable but not sticky.
- Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and let it rest at room temperature for 15–20 minutes.
- Cut the dough in half. Take one piece and keep the other wrapped in plastic wrap.
- Dust the work surface with a little flour and roll out the dough to a thickness of 1/16-1/8 inch (2–3 mm). The thinner you roll the dough, the crispier the pastry will be once fried.
- Cut the dough into roughly 4 x 3⁄4 inch (10 x 2 cm) strips, then pinch them in the middle to create a bow or butterfly shape and place on a tray dusted with flour.
- Heat the sunflower oil in a deep heavy-based saucepan to 335°F/170°C (if you don’t have a thermometer, test the oil is hot enough by dropping in a cube of bread: it should float rather than sink, and sizzle immediately on contact with the oil).
- Once the oil is hot, add some of the pastry strips and fry for about 1 minute, turning them halfway through with a metal spoon, until they turn pale golden – do not let them brown. They cook very quickly!
- Remove them from the oil with a slotted spoon and place them in a sieve to drain the oil.
- Once drained, transfer them to a plate lined with kitchen paper to help absorb any excess oil.
- Leave to cool for 5 minutes, then sprinkle icing sugar on top.
- Ideally serve them straight away, or keep them in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days. If you are keeping them to serve later, sprinkle them with more icing sugar just before serving.
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