Pasta Frolla (Italian Sweet Shortcrust Pastry Recipe): It is an Italian pastry dough made with flour, butter, eggs, sugar, and flavorings. The basic recipe for Pasta Frolla is “sweet shortcrust pastry.”
You can make all sorts of pastries with pasta frolla, like pies, cookies, mignon, and more! After a short time of processing and letting it rest in the fridge, you can bake it in the oven, where it will become crumbly.
Pasta Frolla (Italian Sweet Shortcrust Pastry Recipe)
INGREDIENTS
- 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 12 tablespoons (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, cold, cut into cubes
- 1Â large egg, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ⅓ cup ice water, plus more as needed
INSTRUCTIONS
- Add the flour, sugar, salt and cold butter to the bowl of a food processor. Pulse several times until the butter is broken up into bits the size of peas.
- Add the egg, vanilla zest and water, then pulse 5-6 more times until the mixture comes together and resembles coarse sand and holds together when pressed with your fingers. Add more water 1 tablespoon at a time if needed.
- Transfer to a work surface and use your hands to gently knead a few times until it forms a ball. Be careful not to over work the dough or it will become tough.
- Split the dough into two pieces, form into a disc and wrap tightly with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or up to 2 days. Freeze for up to 3 months for longer storage.
- When ready to use, remove from the refrigerator, then dust a work surface with a little bit of flour. Place the unwrapped dough on the work surface, then dust it with a little more flour.
- Dust a rolling pin with flour, then roll it out to slightly larger than your pie
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NOTES
- There are two pie crusts in this recipe, and each one fits a 9-inch pie plate. It can be used to make one double-crust pie or two single-crust pies.
- I make my pasta frolla very simple so that it can be filled with many different things. But you can change the taste any way you like by using almond extract, lemon zest, or orange zest instead of vanilla extract.
- This will work best if you keep all the items cold at all times.
- Based on the temperature, the pie dough will always need a different amount of water. Add more slowly at first, starting with less.
- Before mixing the dough, I like to put my hands under cold water or hold on to some ice cubes to keep them cool.
SERVING SUGGESTIONS
Now that you’ve mastered this basic sweet shortcrust pastry dough, you’re ready to shape it and fill it to make all kinds of delicious treats. Here are some examples:
- Crostata: Crostata is the Italian version of pie, which is traditionally made with a Pasta Frolla crust. Roll the dough and transfer it to a pie dish or pie tin. Fill it with jams, custards like this old-fashion custard, or berries, like blueberries, before baking. Italian Crostata are usually open-faced.
- Fresh Fruit Crostata: If instead, you want to fill the crostata with fresh custard and fresh fruit, you need to first blind-bake the Pasta Frolla, by covering it with parchment paper and weigh it down with dried beans or ceramic pie weights, and let it cool before filling it. Glaze it with a layer of clear gelatin for the traditional Italian look.
- Tartelettes: These are basically miniature pies, filled with all kinds of creams, custards, jams, or fruits.
- Cookies: Roll the dough and cut it with cookie cutters to make simple shortcrust cookies. Decorate them with melted dark chocolate, coarse sugar or cinnamon sugar!
