I’ve gone to a few Valentine’s dinner parties, where each couple brought a dish with a Valentine’s theme. After eating, we’d vote for best taste and best in theme. These deconstructed connoli won for best in theme the year I brought them.
They’re dead simple to make — as long as you don’t try to make your own pizzelles. And that one’s not on my agenda for a while now. Though really, it’s just like doing waffles but with a smaller press. (I just don’t have one.) Okay, enough rambling, here’s the recipe.
Ingredients
1 pound ricotta cheese
1/3 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla (not pictured, oops)
fresh strawberries
pizzelles
Directions
Drain off any excess liquid from the riccotta before putting it in a large mixing bowl and beating it briefly to break it up.
Add the powdered sugar and vanilla and beat until they’re thoroughly incorporated.
Scoop the cheese mixture into a pastry bag or a cookie press with a large star-shaped tip.
Set the cheese aside, and remove the leaves from the strawberries. Using a paring knife, cut out the stem and any un-ripe part from the top.
Slice the berries about an eighth-inch thick.
Now here’s where it’s unfortunate that Valentine’s Day comes in February. In most of the U.S., strawberries aren’t in season. So you may not have a very good selection. Take a look at the difference between local and factory-farmed berries in this post from two summers ago.
You can see that the ones I was working with only gave two or three nice-looking slices each.
Oh well, you take what you can get. The important thing to notice is if you cut them right, they look sort of like hearts.
Now that everything’s prepped, using the pastry bag or cookie press, load up the center of each pizzelle with a layer of the cheese mixture.
Put a berry in the center of each.
And that’s it.
By the way, these were vanilla pizzelles from the local Italian market, Alesci’s. I could buy myself a pizzelle press and make my own, but as it is I only buy them a couple of times a year. It would take until I’m in my 90s to save enough to make it worth the investment. Sometimes cooking like Grandma means knowing when to go to the bakery.
6 Comments
Simple, elegant — love the last line of text! lol
Pretty! I’m a sucker for a heart-shaped dessert. And a crunchy/creamy/berry one sounds great:)
Hi Drew
I found your blog through your nachos cheese cream…yummy!
I appreciate your blog and your recipe..so I told it
If you want in my blog you can find a homemade Ricotta recipe
http://cuochella.blogspot.com/2009/03/ricotta-fatta-in-casa.html
it’s very simple and it’s better than american ricotta “con latte” (“with milk”…ricotta has always milk :p )
but you must translate it through a translator..like this
http://translate.google.com/#it|en|
Bye bye dear Drew (eheheh…tonguetwister!)
ps. I know, I know… my English is embarassing…sorry :p
These look delicious. I had a nice laugh at your last comment – “Sometimes cooking like Grandma means knowing when to go to the bakery.” – Your Grandma would appreciate that, I’m sure.
Drew,
Is this something a guy can do to surprise his lady on Valentine’s day? I think I may be better off heading to the store, but these look good. Perhaps a nice chocolate drizzle and you’d be in serious business. Thanks for the post!
You can make them easily enough, but if you’re going to surprise her you should probably post the question anonymously, in case she’s in the habit of Googling you to see where you’re hanging out.