(Unedited)
My family would pronounce this Calabrese Christmas pastry “pit-ten-gyooz” and non-Italians in my hometown would call it “P’s and Q’s”; however, based on its spelling, it should be pronounced “peet-tayn-GWEE-zay.” As the holiday season neared, my mom used to make this recipe in massive sizes and quantities. Her sister, my Aunt Ida, showed more restraint and made them smaller, which I gravitate towards, finding them better for giving away. This recipe yields 9 to 10 pittenguisi. We normally make this after Thanksgiving to allow one month for the ingredients to meld together. It's a lot of work, so I just started making a half recipe and it's much easier, though still a lot of work.
One change I've made from the original recipe is to roll out the dough a little thinner, so I always end up using about 2/3 of the dough that this recipe makes. It causes the pittenguise to taste less dry. The photos below do not reflecte this change.
Filling:
3 lbs chopped walnuts
3 lbs raisins, 2 lb normal, 1 lb golden (or none if you don’t like raisins)
3 12 oz packages choc chips
2 lbs honey
1 cup Crisco vegetable oil
1 cup sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
Crust:
8 eggs
2 cups melted Crisco shortening (cooled)
2 cups Crisco vegetable oil
3 cups warm water
3 Tbsp baking powder
1 cup sugar
5 lbs King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
100% cotton string (such as cooking butcher’s twine)
1. Mix filling ingredients together in a very large bowl or pot. Cover with aluminum foil and let sit at room temperature for 24 hours.
2. The next day, melt the Crisco shortening and let it cool to less than 100F. You can use the refrigerator to speed this up a little. If you accidentally let is resolidify, just warm it up until it's liquid again.
3. Mix all wet ingredients for crust in a very large bowl or roasting pan.
4. Add in all baking powder and sugar. Remix.
5. Gradually stir in flour. At some point, you’ll need to mix it in by hand. Once mixed, knead dough for a few minutes.
6. Let dough sit for 30-60 minutes.
7. Preheat oven to 360F.
8. To make one base crust, break off a small piece of dough and form it into a ball of diameter 2.5”.
9. Flatten it into a circle with your hands.
10. Work the roller in a circle to keep the crust circular (btw, this technique also works well with pie crust). The diameter should end up about 8”. Thickness should be about 1/16” (1.5mm). Don’t worry if you don’t get it perfect. You can trim excess, which is what I always end up doing.
11. Now we turn to the inside pastry rolls. Break off a 3x larger (in volume, not diameter) piece than for the base crust.
12. Roll out thin and mostly rectangular about 15" wide and however long it ends up being and however long your workspace can handle. Work the roller left-to-right and front-to-back to spread it into a rectangle. It should end up about 1/16” (1.5mm) thick like the base crust.
13. Lay down filling left to right along the edge closest to you. About 1” wide in filling. I use my hand to grab the filling.
14. Cut 1.5” away from the filling all the way across (right to left). A circular ravioli (straight edge) cutter works well here.
15. Fold over the dough toward you to cover the filling. If you don’t fold it over far enough it will be harder to roll up so try to fold it over and down a little.
16. Cut this strip into three 5" long sections using a knife.
17. Roll up each section right-to-left.
18. Place the first roll in the center of the base crust with the open end of the roll facing up to expose the filling on top.
19. As you add other rolls to the base crust in a similar fashion, pack them tightly next to each other. Don't be afraid to push them together to keep them from falling apart.
20. 8 rolls are about the right number to end up with per base crust, but 5 or 6 is fine if you want to make smaller ones to give away. Push them together one last time to make a nice circular grouping.
21. Trim to leave 1” of border all the way around. Throw the trimmed-off dough back into the bowl of dough. All dough is used. No scraps.
22. Fold up the border of the base crust and press in place all the way around on the sides. Make sure it folds all the way up the sides, otherwise it will leak during baking.
23. Then use 100% cotton string and wrap it snugly twice around the middle (or slightly above the middle) of the outside border and tie it snugly. Cut the string after tying a knot. The pittenguise will expand during baking so it’s important that you don’t pull the string so tight that it bites into the dough too far. That said you don’t want it loose either. The string should indent slightly in the dough.
24. Place this completed pittenguise on an ungreased cookie sheet.
25. Wait until the cookie sheet is full but leave 1” between the individual pittenguises. They will expand during baking. I have large cookie sheets and can fit 4-6 at a time.
26. Bake 30 minutes on the bottom rack.
27. Bake 30 minutes on the top rack. After 15 minutes of this, cover the tray loosely with aluminum foil to avoid burning during the last 15 minutes.
28. You may have trays on the top and bottom racks at the same time. Separate timers come in handy for keeping track of them.
29. Let the finished pittenguises cool on the cookie sheet or on a cookie rack for an hour.
30. Wrap each pittenguise tightly in double-wrapped aluminum foil with the string left in place.
31. Store them in a cool dry place. Definitely wait 24 hours before eating any. As I mentioned in the introduction, ideally these are made one month in advance of Christmas.
32. As I mentioned in the introduction, I now end up not using about 1/3 of the dough as I like to roll it out slightly thinner than I had originally. If you run out of dough, you definitely rolled it out too thick.
These pittenguisi are slightly too doughy. I will update the photos at some point:
