The fried cartocci, together with cannoli and pizzicati represent one of the traditional Sicilian pastry products. Originally from Italy, these cannoli made with a dough of brioche pan stuffed with a cream made with ricotta, sugar and chocolate drops are fried and sprinkled with icing sugar. To prepare fried carton packs, start with the filling, which should rest in the refrigerator for about 4 hours. Drain the ricotta to remove the excess water, then sift it in a narrow mesh sieve by crushing the ricotta with a ladle and a pan in order to remove all the lumps and obtain a soft cream, add the sugar and mix well with a ladle until a creamy mixture is obtained.

In a large bowl put the sifted flour together with the sugar, add the whole egg and lightly beat with a fork. Melt the yeast in 125 ml of warm milk and add this to the dough as well. Melt the lard in a bain-marie or in the microwave and also dissolve the salt in the remaining 125 ml milk. Add the salt with the milk and finally the melted lard. When the dough is more compact, start kneading with your hands. Transfer the dough on a pastry board and continue to knead until the dough is smooth and firm. It will take about 15 minutes. If you have a planetary mixer, start incorporating the ingredients with the leaf and then replace it with the kneading hook.

Place the dough in a bowl and cover it with plastic wrap, let rise in the oven with the light on for about 2 hours. Now take a tray that will contain the fried parcels, cover it with a sheet of parchment paper and brush the parchment paper with oil. Take the traditional cannoli torch. If you do not have the traditional empty tin torches inside, you can make torches by rolling a sheet of aluminum paper about 12 cm wide to reach a diameter of 2 cm. Take the cord and roll it over the torch overlapping the ends so as to fix the dough trying to make at least three turns.

When you twist the string around the torch you absolutely must not pull the dough, but turn it around the torch gently and be careful to leave half a cm of space on one side and the other; during the leavening phase the parcel will also cover that space. Place the rolls on the tray lined with parchment paper and brush with oil. After this time the cartridges will have increased their volume. Put the oil in a 22 cm high pot and heat it, it is important that the oil temperature does not exceed 170 °. Fry the parcels, soaking them in the pot with pliers and turning them often, remove them when they are brown, but not burned. Each cartoccio will have 6/7 minutes of cooking time.

Put them on a sheet of absorbent paper to remove excess oil and let them cool, remove the torches by turning them slightly. Take the ricotta filling and add the chocolate chips. Transfer the mixture into a sac-à-poche with a star-shaped nozzle, stuff the parcels and pass them in the granulated sugar to make them even tastier. Your fried cartons are now ready to be enjoyed.

Ingredients;

  • 1 pound 00 flour, if unavailable use All-Purpose Flour
  • 1 large egg
  • 2 ounces butter
  • 2 ounces granulated sugar
  • 1 lemon, zest only
  • 1 bag of dry yeast
  • lukewarm milk, as much as needed
  • vegetable oil for deep frying
  • Custard Cream
  • Ricotta Cream

Instructions;

  1. In a stand mixer, mix the flour, butter, sugar and lemon zest. Let everything mix well. You want the butter to be fully absorbed by the flour.
  2. Add the yeast and mix then add the egg and mix.
  3. Add enough milk to give you a dough that can be rolled. Not too soft, but not too hard either.
  4. Cover the dough and let it rise for 1 1/2 hours in a warm part of the house.
  5. Take a ball of dough and roll it flat with a rolling pin. Cut the dough into strips of about 1″ wide, 1/4″ thick and about 8″ long.
  6. Wrap each strip in a spiral around a Cannoli tube. Make all your
  7. Cartocci, cover them and leave them to rise for another hour.
  8. Deep fry all the Cartocci until they are golden brown.
  9. Let them cool off and fill them with Ricotta Cream, Custard Cream or a Nutella Mousse