Recipe: Italian Jam Crostata Guest Post from Josué of JosueDiaz.com

Crostata is a favorite dessert of our family. It’s a simple and basic but extremely flavorful dessert consumed in Italy and the region of Puglia, with the specific coastal town of Vieste being the town that inspired this particular dessert. My in-laws were born in Vieste and my mother in-law makes this dessert every few months (while my wife tends to make it every few weeks) and it’s always a popular choice amongst guests for various family gatherings.

The ingredients are the following:
3 cups of flour, divided (our ideal blend is 1.5 cup whole wheat and 1.5 cup unbleached all purpose; we’ve made it with all whole wheat or all unbleached all purpose as well)
10oz jar of spreadable fruit or marmalade (orange marmalade is the traditional flavor used, but we’ve
used dozens of flavors)
1 cup of sugar
1 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
2 eggs (large, at least is what we prefer)
3 teaspoons of baking powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda
Citrus zest (our ideal blend is 1/2 a medium lemon and 1/2 a medium orange; we’ve made it with a whole lemon or a whole orange)

The Tools used:
2 medium sized mixing bowls
Microplane or other fine zesting tool
Non-stick cookie sheet

The preparation method is the following:
1. In one bowl, stir sugar and oil together.
2. Add eggs, vanilla and zest to the same bowl.
3. In a 2nd bowl, mix flour, baking soda and baking powder.
4. Combine wet and dry ingredients into one bowl.
5. Take dough and press down into cookie sheet; make sure to reserve some dough (1/2 cup should be sufficient) for lattice on top of Crostata.
6. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
7. Spread marmalade on top of dough.
8. Roll out lattice and place on top of jam or marmalade
9. Place dough in cookie sheet into oven for 20min or until dough is golden brown.

Delicious! Thank you for sharing, Josué! This looks like a perfect easy dessert.

(Images: Josué Diaz)