Recipes of the tradition: Ricciarelli di Siena

In Tuscany they are much loved and are often given as gifts to friends and relatives during the Christmas period, yet no one knows the exact origin of the Ricciarelli of Siena.
According to a legend, it was the knight Ricciardetto Della Gherardesca who brought back from the Crusades these sweets, once shaped like Middle Eastern footwear, and hence the name "ricciarelli" (from “arricciato”, “curled”).
This story has never been confirmed but what seems certain is that these delicious soft paste biscuits are a reworking of the marzipan sweets, served also at Caterina Sforza's wedding and known since the fifteenth century.
They had in fact arrived in Siena from the East, and it is thought that the origin of the word "marzipan" derives from the city of Martaban in Burma.
Like marzipan, ricciarelli are made with almond flour, egg whites and sugar, but they also contain candied orange peel.
Included among the typical sweets of Siena in the book "Science in the kitchen and the art of eating well" by Pellegrino Artusi in 1891, these almond sweets received the IGP mark in 2010 and are now much loved both in Italy and abroad.

RECIPE OF RICCIARELLI

Ingredients:
- 200 gr of almond flour
- 2 egg whites
- 200 g of icing sugar
- 1 teaspoon of lemon juice
- finely grated peel of 1 orange
- vanilla 1 sachet (or the seeds of a vanilla bean)

Preparation:

Mix the egg whites (room temperature) with a whisk, together with lemon juice, vanilla and orange peel.
Add the almond flour and icing sugar and mix until you get a soft mixture.
Form a ball of the dough and wrap it in plastic wrap, then leave it to rest in the fridge for at least 24 hours.
Remove the dough from the fridge and make a sausage of about 3 cm in diameter by working it on a surfaced sprinkled with icing sugar, finally cut it into pieces of about 20-30 g each.
Roll each piece in icing sugar and model it into a grain shape.
Arrange the ricciarelli on a baking sheet lined with baking paper, spacing them by at least 4-5 cm.
Finally, before putting into the oven, place your fingers moist with water on the surface of the ricciarelli and then sprinkle with plenty of icing sugar.
Bake in a static oven at 150° for 5 minutes and then turn it up to 170° for another 5 minutes until cracks form on the surface. At this point lower the oven to 160° and cook for another 6 minutes.
Let the still soft cakes rest out of the oven for about 1 hour.

Once ready, they can keep for a couple of weeks in a tin box, though they are tastier if eaten in the first two days after being baked. They will be even more delicious if enjoyed with some Vin Santo!