Goat’s milk ricotta fritti with honey and pistachio

This light fritti recipe is quite simple and well-suited to entertaining. Ricotta made with goat’s milk is deliciously creamy with a lovely herbaceous, almost earthy note. To highlight these flavours, I've added the sweetness of honey and texture of pistachios.

Credit: Sharyn Cairns

• makes

  10

• prep

  10 minutes

• cook

  50 minutes

• difficulty

  Mid

Ingredients

• 1 litre goat’s milk
• 100 g pure cream
• 5 g cooking salt
• 30 ml lemon juice
• 40 g self-raising flour, sifted
• 30 g raw caster sugar
• fine zest of 1 lemon
• 2 egg whites
• 40 g butter
• 40 g pistachios, roughly crushed
• 1 tbsp rosemary, picked into individual sprigs
• 80 g honey
• a little black pepper

Resting time 2½ hours

Instructions

Place the milk, cream, salt and lemon juice into a heavy-based pan, give it a stir and put the pan onto a low to medium heat. Once you place it on the heat there’s no need for you to do anything except monitor the rise in temperature. Don’t stir or agitate the pot; do nothing but an occasional prod with your thermometer.

You want it to heat in this slow and gentle manner until it reaches 90°C. You will see the milk take on a slightly yellow tinge and it will look like it’s starting to curdle. This process will take between 30 and 40 minutes.

Once you reach the right temperature remove the pan from the heat and let it sit for another half an hour.

By this stage you should be able to see that the mix has separated slightly and you now have curds and whey. With a slotted spoon or small sieve, gently scoop your ricotta curds out into a colander, lined with muslin or a new Chux cloth, over a bowl. Once you have gotten most of the curds out, gently strain the remaining liquid through a sieve and add any residual bits to your curds in the colander.

All the whey can be kept and used in vegetable ferments, salad dressings and sauces.

Let your ricotta curds sit there for 2 hours to allow all the liquid to strain out and your ricotta to harden a little.

Once you are ready to use the ricotta, place it in a bowl with the flour, sugar and zest and very gently combine it together. 

In a separate bowl whisk your egg whites until they form stiff peaks. Fold the whites through the ricotta in two batches. You will end up with a pure white fluffy looking mix that isn’t perfectly smooth.

Place a large fry pan over a low heat, allow it to warm and then add 10 g of the butter. One it has melted and starts to sizzle, use a large kitchen spoon to gently dollop out your fritti into the pan. You will need to do this in two batches so aim to make five fritters per batch.

Let them cook for a minute or so until they are a dark golden brown and then carefully flip and repeat on the other side. They should look pillowy and will still be a little runny on the inside. Once cooked transfer to a wire rack and place in a warm spot while you tackle the next batch.

Wipe out your pan with some paper towel and add another 10 g of butter for your next batch.

Once all the fritti have been cooked, wipe your pan out again and add in the remaining butter, along with the pistachios and the rosemary. Give it all a swirl and a few moments to get toasty before adding in the honey and a little black pepper.

Once it’s all had a moment to mingle and starts to bubble, arrange your fritti on a serving plate, sprinkle over the pistachios and drizzle over the honey mix.

Cook’s tips

•  If you don’t wish to make your own ricotta you can use a shop-bought product (you will need about 1 cup) but the texture and flavour will be quite different.

• If you don’t have a thermometer you can still make this recipe. Simply heat the goat’s milk mix until you see the steam starting to rise off the surface of the liquid. That will be about the right temperature.

Photography by Sharyn Cairns. Styling by Lee Blaylock. Food preparation by Peta Gray. Creative concept by Lou Fay.

Always on the hunt for the next vegetable to pickle, follow O Tama Carey on Instagram.

This recipe is part of The Seasonal Cook: Goat column. View previous The Seasonal Cook columns and recipes.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.