Almond Cream Crema Di Mandorle Food

ALMOND CREAM

Steps:

• Place the almonds in a food processor and process to a fine meal.
• Combine the eggs and sugar in a bowl and whisk until pale and creamy.
• Fold in the cream, brandy and then the almonds. Serve immediately.

RICE & ALMOND PUDDING (RIS A L'AMANDE)

Steps:

• In a medium saucepan, combine rice and milk. Cook over medium heat 45 minutes or until rice is tender; set aside to cool.
• In a medium bowl, whip cream until stiff; stir in vanilla. Stir whipped cream, sugar and chopped almonds into cooled rice mixture. Spoon into a serving dish. Refrigerate 3 to 4 hours. Sprinkle with toasted almonds.
• To make sauce: Heat cherries with juice. Dissolve cornstarch in a little water. Stir into cherries; gently stir over medium heat until thickened. Flavor with liquer, if desired. Serve rice pudding with hot cherry sauce.
• Interesting note: It was once traditional in Denmark to include 1 whole almond in the rice pudding. The person who found it would receive the prize-a marzipan pig.

TORTA DI MANDORLE CON ARANCIA ALMOND AND ORANGE CAKE

Steps:

• Pre-heat oven to 350 F (180 C).
• Grease and flour an 8 inch (20 cm) springform cake tin.
• Beat together the egg yolks and sugar until pale, thick and creamy.
• Fold in the potato flour. Fold in the almonds, orange zest and juice.
• Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then fold into the mixture.
• Turn into the prepared tin.
• Bake in the oven for 45 minutes until golden brown and firm to the touch. Remove from the tin and leave to cool on a wire rack.
• Dust with sifted icing sugar before serving.

FOCACCIA DI MANDORLE (ALMOND TORTE FROM TUSCANY)

Steps:

• Dough:.
• Mix all the dough ingredients and knead until smooth. Halve dough and form each half into a ball. Wrap them in cling film. Leave in the fridge for 1 hour.
• Preheat oven to 180°C/355°F Roll out each dough between 2 pieces of lining paper until you get a circle of 11 inches. Shape the circle with your hands, so that you will get a smooth edge. There is no need to get a perfect circle. Bake 15 minutes or until cooked and golden. Let cool.
• Custard:.
• Put milk into a pan. Slice vanilla bean lengthwise. Scratch out black stuff inside vanilla bean with the blade of a knife and add it to the milk together with the sliced vanilla bean. Bring to a boil. Let cool.
• Using an electric mixer, mix yolks and sugar for 2 minutes. Add flour and mix until well combined.
• Remove vanilla bean from milk. Add yolk mixture.
• Stirring all the time, cook mixture on medium-low heat until thickened. The mixture mustn't boil.
• Let custard cool, stirring frequently to avoid building a skin on top.
• Now you've got two variations. The original recipe says to spread 1 biscuit with the cooled filling, to top it with the remaining biscuit, to dust it with the icing sugar and to sprinkle it with the toasted slivered almonds. As I feared that the slivered almonds would fall off that way when you cut it, I reserved a small amount of the filling and spread it on top of the second biscuit, topped it then with the almonds and finally dusted the foccacia di mandorle with icing sugar.

ALMOND CREAM (CREMA DI MANDORLE)

Steps:

• Lightly grease a baking sheet; set aside.
• Melt butter in a small skillet over low heat. Add sugar; cook until golden brown, stirring constantly. Stir in almonds. Spread almond mixture on greased baking sheet; cool completely. Crush into crumbs.
• In a medium bowl, whip cream until stiff. Fold in brandy or liqueur. Reserve some of the crumbled almond mixture to sprinkle over the top of dessert. Fold remaining crumbs into whipped cream.
• Spoon into 4 to 6 dessert dishes. Sprinkle with reserved almond crumb mixture. Refrigerate until set.