A year of Italian food (+recipe)

Torte Rustica Alla Ricotta. Photo / Supplied

Let your tastebuds travel with a cookbook that celebrates the seasonal foods of Italy.

Here's a year of eating and travelling we'd like to replicate: autumn in Piemonte, winter in the Alps and spring in Sicily. Instead, we have to daydream over the three titles of the food and travel books of Sydney-based cook and writer Manuela Darling-Gansser. Her fourth, aptly called Four Seasons, rounds up the Italian-Swiss writer's favourite recipes.

She points out that the geography of Italy means that seasonality varies hugely around the country. "When you talk about seasons in Italy you end up talking about regions as well. Spring comes early in Sicily while Piemonte in the north-west may still be under snow. People have strong views about which region is best in a particular season and, being Italy, these views can be very different," she says. "There is definitely a right time to eat certain foods if you want them at their very best."

Her spring dishes are mostly from Sicily, the first region to experience the new season's warmth. Ricotta is Sicily's most famous cheese, produced in the spring before the heat gets too much, and eaten super-fresh from the bowl with crusty bread. Baking the cheese into dishes such as a pie extends its life.

"If you want to enjoy food that is varied, right for the time of year and the best possible expression of the taste and goodness of the ingredients themselves, then you must eat seasonally. Anything else is a second-rate experience," Manuela declares.

Torte rustica alla ricotta
Ricotta pie (Serves 6)

This dish is fabulous for lunch, as an alternative to quiche. Enjoy it with a crisp, mixed green salad.

Pastry

500g unbleached plain flour
150g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 organic egg
125ml medium-dry marsala
50g freshly grated pecorino
1 tsp salt
Ground black pepper

Filling

500g fresh full-cream ricotta
150g prosciutto, cut into strips
100g freshly grated parmigiano
100g pecorino piccante, grated
2 organic eggs
Ground black pepper

1 Put all the pastry ingredients into a food processor and pulse until the dough is just amalgamated. Roll it into a ball and place it in the refrigerator to rest for an hour.

2 Preheat the oven to 200C (gas mark 6) and butter a 23cm ovenproof dish.

3 Break off just over half of the pastry and roll it out on a lightly floured work surface to about 5mm thick then lift it into the prepared dish so the pastry comes up the sides.

4 Mix all the filling ingredients together and season with pepper. (The cheeses and prosciutto are fairly salty, so you don't need to add any salt.)

5 Pour the filling into the pastry and smooth the surface.

6 Roll out the remaining pastry and use it to cover the pie.

7 Press around the rim to seal the edges and prick the pie lid all over with a fork.

8 Transfer to the oven and bake for 30 minutes or until golden-brown.

9 Remove the pie from the oven and leave it to cool down completely before serving. If it is still warm, the ricotta will be too runny to cut into neat slices.

* Extract with permission from Four Seasons by Manuela Darling-Gansser, photography by Simon Griffiths, Hardie Grant Books, $59.99, distributed by Random House.