Torta Rustica

The great thing about this rustic country style pie, which is perfect for the days out in a park, is that you can use whatever you have available in your fridge as long as you use ricotta and mozzarella cheese as you base ingredients.  It's very generous is size,( individual pies would be even better for picnics) so all you need to add to it for a tasty fulfilling br(l)unch is a handful of green salad.

Torta Rustica

Makes 1 pie, 26 cm springform cake pan, oven temperature: 180C/350F/gas 4

to make the dough follow my Basic pizza dough

For the filling:

5 eggs, separated

6

300 g ricotta cheese

200 g mozzarella, diced

100 g salami, ham or similar 

30 g freshly grated Parmesan cheese

10 cherry tomatoes, halved

Make the dough, cover and leave it to rest until doubled in size. 

Beat 4 of the egg yolks, add salt and pepper, then mix with the ricotta. Whisk all the egg whites until stiff and fold into he ricotta mixture and combine with the rest of the ingredients that you are using. 

Uncover  the dough, punch the air out and pull the 2/3 of the dough into a circle big enough to cover the bottom and sides of the cake pan, about 35 cm in diameter. Drape the extra dough over the edge. Spoon in the filling and cover with the remaining dough, thinly rolled out and cut into 8 strips. Use them to make a lattice top over the top of the pie. Trim around the edge and place halved cherry tomatoes in each square of the lattice. Brush the strips with the beaten remained egg yolk.

Bake in the preheated oven for 40-45 minutes until golden. Serve warm or cold with your favourite salad.

Adapted from the Easy Kitchen