From Liguria with love… Here is the onion cake!

The Ligurian onion pie is a quick and easy to make appetizer, with a light external dough and a creamy and tasty filling.

A thin shell of crazy pasta encloses a creamy filling with a unique flavour. Genoese onion pie is a typical Italian product, handed down from generation to generation. The preparation is very simple, because you just need to create a common pasta and fill it with this delicious vegetable with a sweet aftertaste. Alternatively, if you are in a hurry, you can opt for the classic ready-made puff pastry or brisée.

The result is a vegetarian savory pie that will conquer your palate at first taste. The original recipe for this quick cake involves adding prescinseua to the filling. It is a very creamy cheese typical of the area but if you are unable to obtain it you can replace it with ricotta and yogurt .

How to prepare the Ligurian onion pie recipe

1. First prepare the pasta matta which will serve both as a base and as a covering. Place the flour in a bowl, add the salt and oil and start kneading, adding the water little at a time. When the dough takes consistency, finish working it on the pastry board. It should be smooth and homogeneous.
2. Shape it into a loaf and wrap it in cling film. Let it rest for 30 minutes.
3. For the filling , wash and peel the onions. Cut them into thin rounds.
4. Pour a drizzle of oil onto the bottom of a pan, add the onions and a pinch of salt and sauté for 15 minutes , stirring occasionally. Once ready, let them cool .
5. In a bowl, combine the prescinseua (or half the weight of ricotta and half the yogurt), the onions, the grated Parmesan and 1 egg and season with salt and pepper. Mix.
6. Take the dough and divide it into two parts (one slightly larger than the other). Roll out the larger one with a rolling pin to obtain a sheet suitable for covering the bottom and edges of the pan of approximately 22-24 cm in diameter .
7. Grease the mold and place the pastry. Pour the filling with onions and level it.
8. Roll out the other half of the dough and use it to cover the cake, folding the edges to close it.
9. Cook in a preheated oven at 180°C for 45 minutes .

Prescinseua is a difficult cheese to find so our advice is to replace it with half ricotta and half sugar-free plain yogurt . You can also use ricotta alone but you will lose the acidic note that distinguishes this savory pie. Some people usually flavor the filling with marjoram : adjust according to your tastes.

Conservation

Presented at the table, this savory onion pie will be a real success. You can also store it in the fridge , covered, for 2-3 days .

Origin and history

Liguria boasts a large repertoire of savory pies , all purely vegetarian because they were created with the aim of finding lean alternatives to the classic fish-based dishes to be consumed during Lent. The first written trace of the onion cake is found in Bartolomeo Scappi's 1557 recipe book. Here it is mentioned as Genoese onion gattafura where the term refers to gateau fourré , i.e. stuffed pie.

Another presumed ancestor of the recipe is zwiebelkuchen , typical of German cuisine . In this case, however, bacon and cream are added to the filling, departing quite a bit from Ligurian cuisine.

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