Herb Torte

Herb Torte

from The Art of Cooking by Maestro Martino of Como

Herb Torte for the Month of May

Take the same amount of cheese as above, and crush well, and mix fifteen or sixteen egg whites with a cup or about a cup of good milk, and take a good amount of chard, that is, as the main ingredient, and a little marjoram, a lot of age, a bit of mint, and a lot of parsley. Crush all these herbs together well, squeezing out their water, and pass through a stamine. Add their water together with the things above and add to them a half libra of good rendered lard or fresh butter; and take a few leaves of parsley and just a few leaves of marjoram, and but and chop as finely as possible, and grind well in a mortar, incorporating them with the above things, adding a half ounce of white ginger and eight ounces of sugar. Make sure that this mixture is well incorporated in a pot that you put over hot coals, away from the flame, stirring continuously with a spoon or other appropriate tool for this purpose, until it seems to begin to thicken like a fine broth. When this has been done, prepare a thin dough in a pan, and fill it with the above things, that is, this filling, gently applying medium heat on the top and on the bottom.
When it appears to you to have thickened, remove and top with fine sugar and some rose water. As for such tortes or herb totes, whatever you may wish to call them, the greener they are, the better, as they will have a more handsome appearance that way.

Lady Ellie's Redaction:
crust—made from Flour, tallow, salt
1 c Ricotta Cheese
2 ½ c minced chard
½ c snipped parsley
2 TBSP minced sage
2 tsp minced mint
dashes of marjoram, ginger and salt
3 eggs
2 TBSP sugar

I considered that just extracting the juice of most of the herbs was a terrible waste of nutrition, and
incorporated all of them finely chopped. To my taste, the amount of sugar called for was too much and I would cut it down in a repeat trial. I'm out of rose water, and don't think it would complement this dish anyway, but some might disagree. The filling bakes just fine without the pre-cooking step, but perhaps if the herbs had been juiced that step might have been needed.
The crusts for all these tortes were made by the hot water method suggested in the link his Excellency
offered a few months ago (boil water and suet or lard and beat the flour into it) I find it works quite
well. For vegetarians it would be fine with a butter or oil crust.