A Crostata in the Borrowed Bowl

The afternoon turned out mild and clear, so I took the long way up the lane where the vineyards start, past the trees at the bend where the last pears are still hanging — small, hard, and refusing to be finished with the season. The grapes are nearly all in now, and the leaves have gone that tired yellow they get just before they drop. Somebody further up was burning vine cuttings, which is one of my favorite smells and gone in ten minutes. I didn’t go anywhere in particular. I walked to the top of the rise, looked at the hills stacked up behind each other, and came back down.

The errand I’d been putting off was the neighbor’s bowl, the big one she lent me when I made the grape jam and my own weren’t wide enough. I don’t like handing back a borrowed thing empty, so I made a small crostata with one of the jars and carried it over inside the bowl. She had the door open before I knocked and the moka on before I sat down, and what was going to be two minutes turned into an hour, which is the correct length for a coffee visit. Her moka makes the same sound mine does — that last little gurgle and spit — and it put me straight back in my mother’s kitchen, watching her take the pot off the flame and tip it upside down the second it finished. I hadn’t thought about that in years. Nothing actually happened in the memory, which is exactly why I keep it.

For the crostata I used the trick I always forget and then remember with relief: roll the pasta frolla between two sheets of parchment instead of on a floured board. You don’t work in extra flour, so the dough stays short and tender, and it lifts into the tin without tearing. The less you handle it, the better it behaves — I keep meaning to apply that to more of my day than baking.

By the time I got home the light had gone long and gold and there was the first real cold in the air. I had a slice of the crostata with tea, standing at the counter, and it was better than it had any right to be for something made to use up a jar. The bowl is back where it belongs, and there are still two jars on the shelf.

Recipe: Crostata di Marmellata (Grape Jam Tart)

Ingredients

• 300 g plain flour
• 150 g cold butter, cubed
• 100 g sugar
• 1 egg plus 1 yolk
• grated zest of half a lemon
• a pinch of salt
• about 300 g grape jam (or any jam)

Preparation

1. Rub the cold butter into the flour and sugar with your fingertips until it looks like coarse crumbs. Add the egg, yolk, zest, and salt, and bring it together into a soft dough without overworking it. Flatten into a disc, wrap, and rest in the fridge at least 30 minutes.
2. Heat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Roll two-thirds of the dough between sheets of parchment to fit a 24 cm tart tin, and press it in, letting the edges come up a little.
3. Spread the jam over the base, not too thick. Roll the remaining dough, cut it into strips, and lay them over the top in a lattice.
4. Bake 30–35 minutes, until the pastry is golden and the jam bubbles at the edges. Cool before cutting — it sets as it cools.