Italian Easter Pie | Torta Pasqualina
Updated: Oct 24
Torta pasqualina is a savoury pie, whatever its name suggests: a tall golden case of paper thin pastry filled with chard, marjoram and fresh curd cheese, with whole eggs baked into the filling so that a cut wedge often reveals a yolk at its centre. There is no butter and no puff pastry, only oil, water, flour and patience.
Yield: 10 wedges from one 10 in (25 cm) pie. Prep: 1 hour 30 minutes, including the rest. Bake: 50 minutes. Difficulty: advanced. Course: antipasto. Region: Liguria.
The Story
Torta pasqualina is the Easter pie of Genoa and the Ligurian coast, and its construction reads as a lesson in local economics. The steep hills behind the Riviera never offered much grazing, so butter was a luxury and olive oil was the everyday fat. The pastry is therefore made from oil, water and flour, stretched into leaves so delicate that a newspaper can be read through them, and stacked with more oil brushed between each one. It is what a region built on olives does when it wants to make something festive.
Tradition asks for thirty three sheets, one for each year of the life of Christ, with roughly two thirds below the filling and the rest above. The filling is the spring garden: chard, sometimes wild greens and borage, bound with prescinseua, the lightly acidic fresh curd cheese of the region, then Parmigiano, marjoram and a little nutmeg. Whole eggs are set into it, and the yolks are read as a symbol of the new life the season celebrates.
Its natural moment is Pasquetta, the Monday after Easter, when Ligurian families carry baskets into the hills and eat the pie cold, cut in wedges, with a bottle of white wine. Oil scented pastry travels well, and the pie tastes better a few hours after baking than it does straight from the oven. Artichoke versions exist in the west of the region, and some cooks add a little rice, but chard, curd cheese and eggs is the combination Genoa recognises as its own.
The word torta in Liguria does not mean cake. It names the savoury pies that fill the bakeries of the Riviera, from the vegetable torta to the rice pie of Sarzana, and pasqualina is the most ceremonial of them. Because oil is the only fat in the dough, its quality is tasted in every layer, and the sweet, mild oil of the Taggiasca olive is what makes the pastry taste of the place. A bitter or grassy oil would announce itself in the first bite, which is why Ligurian cooks buy their oil for this pie as carefully as they buy the chard.
There is also a quiet logic in the fillings. Fresh curd cheese, greens and eggs were the produce of a small garden and a few hens, and they arrived together in early spring, just as the Lenten fast ended. The pie takes the whole household kitchen, in one tall shape, to the table at once.
Ingredients
For the olive oil pastry
All purpose flour, 3 1/2 cups (450 g)
Fine sea salt, 1 1/2 tsp (9 g)
Extra virgin olive oil, 1/4 cup (60 ml)
Warm water, at 104°F (40°C), about 1 cup (240 ml)
Extra virgin olive oil for brushing the sheets, 1/2 cup (120 ml)
For the greens
Swiss chard, untrimmed, 3 lb (1.4 kg)
Spring onions, 4
Extra virgin olive oil, 3 tbsp (45 ml)
Fine sea salt, 1 tsp (6 g)
For the cheese filling
Prescinseua, or whole milk ricotta drained overnight, 1 lb 2 oz (500 g)
Fresh lemon juice, only if using ricotta, 2 tsp (10 ml)
Parmigiano Reggiano, grated, 3/4 cup (75 g)
Eggs, for binding the filling, 2
Fresh marjoram leaves, chopped, 2 tbsp (6 g)
Fine sea salt, 1/2 tsp (3 g)
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Freshly grated nutmeg, 1/8 tsp
For the egg wells and finishing
Whole eggs, at room temperature, 6
Unsalted butter, 2 tbsp (30 g)
Parmigiano Reggiano, grated, 2 tbsp (12 g)
Salt and pepper, a small pinch per well
Extra virgin olive oil for the pan and the top, 2 tbsp (30 ml)
Optional
Borage leaves, chopped, 3 1/2 oz (100 g), replacing an equal weight of chard
Flaky sea salt, a small pinch, for the cut wedge
Lemon, 1, for dressing the leaves at the table
Preparation
Mixing the dough and resting it slack
Combine the flour and salt in a large bowl. Add the 1/4 cup of oil and most of the warm water, mix to a shaggy mass, then knead on the bench for 8 minutes until the dough is smooth, elastic and softer than bread dough, adding the last of the water if it feels stiff. Divide into 18 balls of about 1 1/2 oz (40 g) each, rub them lightly with oil, cover and rest at room temperature for at least 1 hour. The dough should feel like an earlobe, soft and slightly tacky, and it should not spring back when pressed with a fingertip.
Wilting and squeezing the chard
Strip the leaves from the ribs, wash them well and cook in a wide pot with only the water clinging to them for about 5 minutes, until completely limp. Cool, then twist small handfuls in a clean cotton cloth until no more liquid comes out. Chop fine. You should have roughly 10 oz (280 g) of dense, dry greens.
Softening the onions and finishing the greens
Slice the spring onions and cook them gently in the 3 tablespoons of oil for 5 minutes without colour. Add the chopped chard and the salt, stir for 3 minutes to drive off any last moisture, then spread on a plate and cool completely. Warm greens would start to cook the eggs in the filling and turn it grainy.
Building the cheese filling
Stir the prescinseua, or the ricotta with its lemon juice, with 3/4 cup of Parmigiano, the 2 eggs, marjoram, salt, pepper and nutmeg until smooth. Fold in the cooled greens. Taste for salt. The mixture should hold a spoon mark without weeping, and it should taste slightly over seasoned, since the pastry around it is plain.
Rolling and layering the base sheets
Heat the oven to 375°F (190°C) and oil a 10 in (25 cm) springform pan. Roll one ball on a lightly floured bench, stretching it with your hands over the backs of the knuckles, until it is nearly transparent and about 14 in (35 cm) wide. Drape it into the pan, brush it with oil, and repeat with nine more sheets, letting the edges hang over the rim.
Spreading the filling and shaping the wells
Spoon in the filling and level it gently. Press six hollows into the surface, one at the centre and five around it, with the back of a spoon. Put a little butter, a pinch of Parmigiano, salt and pepper in each.
Cracking in the eggs and closing the pie
Crack each egg into a small cup and slide it into its well. Roll and lay the remaining 8 sheets one at a time, brushing each with oil, without pressing. Fold the overhanging edges up over the top, pleat them into a rope to seal, brush the surface with oil and prick the gaps between the eggs.
Baking and cooling
Bake on a tray on the lower rack for 45 to 50 minutes, until the dome is deep gold and crisp. Cool in the pan for at least 30 minutes before releasing the ring, so the filling sets. Trim any pastry that has escaped, and brush the crust once more with oil while it is still warm, which softens the edges and gives a light sheen.
Plating
Serve the pie warm or at room temperature, never straight from the refrigerator. Cut it with a serrated knife, using a gentle sawing motion so the crisp top shatters cleanly instead of collapsing, and slice through the centre of the middle egg first, then divide the rest into ten wedges so that as many as possible show a golden yolk.
Use a plain white plate. Lay the wedge slightly off centre and add a small handful of bitter leaves dressed with lemon and Ligurian oil, a few Taggiasca olives, and a drizzle of oil over the cut face. The plate needs nothing else. If the pie is served as an antipasto for a table, put a whole pie on a board and cut it in front of the guests, which is exactly how it is served at a Ligurian Easter lunch.
Professional Technique
The layering of this pie comes from oil, not from folded butter. Puff pastry laminates one thick sheet through many folds with fat trapped between them. Here every layer is a separate sheet of dough, stretched by hand until it is transparent, and brushed with olive oil before the next one lands on top. The oil is a barrier: without it the moist sheets would weld into one flat pastry. With it, the water in the dough turns to steam in the oven and pushes the sheets apart into a crisp stack with air between the layers.
Three habits follow from that principle. The dough is rested for an hour because freshly kneaded gluten springs back and tears when it is stretched, while rested dough relaxes and can be drawn to transparency. The sheets are laid over one another loosely and never pressed down, since pressure squeezes out the film of oil and the air, and the layers bond. Let them fall in soft folds and overlap at the edges, and expect the pan to look unruly before baking.
The wells finish the design. Pressing hollows into the filling with the back of a spoon makes a cup of dense filling around each egg, insulating it while the layers above and below bake. The yolk, protected by its white and by the cheese, stays creamy at the centre when the pie comes out. Make each well deep enough to hold a whole egg, and add the eggs only when the top sheets are ready to follow, so the yolks are not left standing while the oven waits.
Texture and Moisture Control
Water is the enemy of this pie, and most of the work is about removing it before the oven. Cooked chard holds a startling amount of liquid, which is why it is wrung out in a cloth until it is dense, then dried again in the pan. Ricotta, if it replaces prescinseua, needs a night in a sieve. A wet filling steams the lower sheets into a pale, gummy layer instead of a crisp one.
Placing the pan on a preheated tray on the lower rack gives the base immediate heat, so the bottom sheets set and brown rather than soak. The oil brushed on top does two jobs: it colours the dome and it protects the upper sheets from drying into a hard crust. Prick the gaps, so steam can leave without blowing out the seams. A pie that is sealed tight with no outlet swells, then sags as it cools, and leaves a hollow under the dome that the filling never fills again.
Rest is a texture step too. A pie cut straight from the oven bleeds its filling, because the cheese and eggs are still fluid. Thirty minutes lets them firm into a sliceable custard while the pastry stays crisp. Served cold, the filling is dense and the oil sweet, but it loses its aroma, so give a refrigerated slice 30 minutes at room temperature before eating.
Professional Mise en Place
The pie is a matter of order more than speed. Prepare in the sequence below and nothing waits on anything else.
Equipment and tools
Springform pan, 10 in (25 cm), and a baking tray to preheat under it
Long thin rolling pin, or a pasta machine set to its second thinnest setting
Wide soft pastry brush and a small bowl of oil
Clean cotton cloth for the chard and a bench cleared of everything else
Prepared ahead
Dough balls, rested and covered, up to 3 hours
Cooked, squeezed and cooled greens, up to 1 day, refrigerated
Filling mixed and refrigerated, up to 1 day
Eggs out of the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking
Parmigiano grated and butter portioned into six small pieces for the wells
Oven and tray heating for at least 20 minutes
Service setup
Pie cooled at least 30 minutes, released and set on a board
Serrated knife, wiped between cuts
Lemon dressed leaves and olives, prepared just before plating
Plain white plates at room temperature
Small bowl of oil and a spoon for the final drizzle
Chef Tips
Cover the dough balls and any rolled sheets with a slightly damp cloth while you work. A dry skin on a sheet cracks when it is folded and leaves a hole the oil leaks through. Roll larger than the pan needs, so the overhang is generous enough to seal the dome without stretching.
Taste the chard water while you squeeze it. If it is bitter, wash the leaves once more, since bitterness concentrates in a pie that does not lose its moisture. A little borage, if you can find it, adds a cucumber note that Ligurian cooks prize.
Slide each egg from a cup, not from the shell, so a broken yolk never lands in the pie. If the yolk breaks, keep the egg for another dish and use a fresh one.
If the dome darkens too quickly, cover it loosely with foil for the last 15 minutes. The eggs are done when the whites are set but the yolks still tremble faintly in their wells.
Common Mistakes
Skipping the rest. Dough that has not relaxed springs back and tears. Rest it for a full hour.
Leaving the greens wet. Any moisture from the chard turns the base sheets into paste. Squeeze until the cloth comes away nearly dry.
Pressing the sheets down. Compressing the layers pushes out the oil and air, and the sheets fuse into one dense crust.
Brushing too lightly. A dry patch bonds two sheets together and cannot lift. Oil the whole surface, corner to corner.
Cutting the pie hot. The filling has not set, and the wedge slumps and leaks. Wait at least 30 minutes.
Rolling the sheets too thick. Sheets that are merely thin, not transparent, bake into heavy pastry. Keep stretching until the bench shows through, and if a hole appears, patch it with a scrap.
Overbaking the eggs. Past 50 minutes the yolks turn chalky. Check at 45 minutes and take the pie out when the whites are set. Residual heat finishes the job while the pie rests.
Wine Pairing
Riviera Ligure di Ponente Pigato DOC: The natural local match. Its herbal, almost marjoram scented aroma echoes the filling, while firm acidity and a saline finish cut through the oil in the pastry and the richness of the curd cheese and yolk. A dry, medium bodied white with enough weight to stand next to a substantial pie.
Cinque Terre DOC: A lean, mineral white from terraced coastal vineyards. High acidity refreshes the palate between wedges, and its light body respects the delicate greens without covering them. The saline, almost sea breeze finish suits the salt in the Parmigiano and lifts the flavour of the chard.
Rossese di Dolceacqua DOC: A pale, fragrant Ligurian red with gentle tannin and red cherry fruit. It suits the pie served cold on Pasquetta, adds a peppery note against the nutmeg, and never overpowers the egg. Serve it slightly cool, around 60°F (16°C), so its fruit stays bright and the tannin stays soft next to the pastry.
Trento DOC: A dry metodo classico. Fine bubbles and crisp acidity lift the fat from the olive oil and the yolk, and the yeasty, toasted notes echo the browned pastry. Serve very cold. This is the choice for a celebratory Easter table, where a sparkling wine can open the meal and follow the pie through to the last slice.
Storage & Reheating
Keep the cooled pie covered in the refrigerator for up to 3 days, in its pan or wrapped in parchment inside an airtight container. Slices freeze reasonably well for 1 month, wrapped individually, though the pastry loses some of its crispness and the yolks firm up when thawed.
To reheat, place slices on a rack over a tray in an oven at 350°F (175°C) for 12 to 15 minutes, until the edges crackle and the centre is warm. Avoid the microwave, which steams the sheets and toughens the eggs. The pie is equally good served cold, so reheating is optional. Do not stack slices while they are still warm, because trapped steam softens the pastry, and keep the pie away from strongly scented foods in the refrigerator, since the oil in the sheets absorbs odours easily.
Nutrition
Per serving, based on 10 wedges from one 10 in (25 cm) pie:
Calories: 430 kcal
Total Fat: 26 g
Saturated Fat: 8 g
Trans Fat: 0 g
Unsaturated Fat: 17 g
Cholesterol: 155 mg
Sodium: 690 mg
Total Carbohydrates: 34 g
Fiber: 3 g
Total Sugars: 3 g
Added Sugars: 0 g
Protein: 17 g
Lactose: 2.1 g
Principal micronutrients: vitamin K, vitamin A, folate, calcium, iron, magnesium
These figures are estimates and depend on how heavily the sheets are brushed.
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