Torta Pasqualina is a traditional Ligurian Easter pie made with greens, ricotta, egg, and cheese. It's super easy and delicious and the perfect way to celebrate Easter.
Torta Pasqualina, a Ligurian Easter pie made with pastry, spinach or greens, ricotta, eggs, and cheese.
Traditionally the pastry consisted of 33 layers to represent the life of Christ. Our recipe uses ready-made puff pastry for ease and is super easy to put together. You can easily adapt it with any greens you like and different cheeses.
When cut into slices you can see the cooked eggs throughout the spinach and ricotta filling, it looks so impressive and is perfect for celebrating Easter.
Ingredients - what you need
See the photo below that shows you everything you need to make this recipe plus some important notes on ingredients.
- Puff pastry - we use all-butter ready-rolled puff pastry for ease and convenience but you can make your own if you prefer.
- Spinach - if your spinach has any hardy stalks remove them before sautéing. You can also use other greens such as chicory and Swiss chard.
- Ricotta - use whole milk ricotta and drain off any excess milk before mixing with the filling ingredients.
- Onion & garlic - these are sauteed with the spinach for added flavour, you could also use shallots.
- Nutmeg - just a pinch makes adds a lovely flavour to the filling.
- Cheese - you can use pecorino or parmesan cheese for this.
- Eggs - use large free-range eggs if possible.
Grease a 9 inch pie dish and set aside. Remove the pastry from the fridge.
Heat the olive oil in a large pan and add the onion, saute it for about 5 minutes until softened and translucent (photo 1).
Add the garlic and cook for about 1 minute until fragrant then add the spinach (photo 2).
Saute the spinach, stirring often until just wilted and no more. Transfer the cooked spinach and onion to a wooden cutting board or bowl and let it cool.
Once cooled roughly chop the spinach mixture into small pieces. Put it in a large mixing bowl with the ricotta, egg, parmesan cheese, pinch of nutmeg, and a good pinch of salt and pepper (photo 3 - 5).
Cover the bottom and sides of your pie dish with one sheet of puff pastry. Trim the edges and fill in the gaps if any (photo 6).
Add the filling to the pie and spread out evenly. Create four deep wells in the filling to hold the eggs. Crack the raw eggs into the well and sprinkle each with a tiny amount of salt (photos 8 & 9).
Place the second sheet of puff pastry on top making sure it’s directly on top of the filling. Fold the edges over to seal the pie (photo 10).
Brush the top of the pie with a beaten egg then make a small cut in the middle of the pie with a sharp knife so steam can escape (photo 11).
Bake in the oven for 50 minutes then let cool completely before serving (photo 12).
Recipe tips and FAQs
- Pastry - ready-rolled puff pastry makes this pie super easy to make but you can make your own or use another pastry like shortcrust pastry (pie crust).
- Make wells for the eggs - it's important to make wells deep enough in the filling to hold the eggs, if they are too shallow the egg will spill over onto the top.
- Greens to use - you can use pretty much any greens you like for the filling. Chicory and Chard are commonly used along with spinach. Choose a mix or whatever you like.
- Wilting the greens - make sure you remove the spinach or whatever greens you are using as soon as they have wilted or too much water will be realised. If this has happened you'll need to squeeze some water out so the filling isn't too wet.
- Decorate it - if you want to impress you can decorate the top of your pie with Easter designs made out of leftover pastry (cookie cutters are great for this). Make sure to brush them with a beaten egg before baking.
Absolutely, you can prepare the filling and keep it in the fridge for 2-3 days or prepare the whole pie in advance.
More Italian Easter recipes
- Italian Easter Bread (Pane di Pasqua)
- Pizza Rustica (Italian Easter Pie)
- Italian Lamb Ragu (Ragu di Agnello)
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📖 Full Recipe
Torta Pasqualina
Ingredients
- 1.5 lbs ready rolled puff pastry (750g)
- 14 oz baby spinach (400g)
- 1 onion finely chopped
- 2 cloves garlic
- 2 cups ricotta (500g)
- 1 cup Parmigiano Reggiano or Pecorino cheese freshly grated (40g)
- 5 large eggs
- 1 pinch nutmeg
- Salt and pepper
- 1-2 tablespoon olive oil
- Butter for greasing
Instructions
- Grease a 9 inch pie dish and set aside. Remove the pastry from the fridge.
- Heat the olive oil in a large pan and add the onion, saute it for about 5 minutes until softened and translucent.
- Add the garlic and cook for about 1 minute until fragrant then add the spinach. Saute the spinach, stirring often until just wilted and no more. Transfer the cooked spinach and onion to a wooden cutting board or bowl and let it cool.
- Once cooled roughly chop the spinach mixture into small pieces. Put it in large mixing bowl with the ricotta (500g/2 cups), 1 large egg, parmesan cheese (1 cup), pinch of nutmeg and a good pinch of salt and pepper.
- Preheat the oven to 350F/180C.
- Cover the bottom and sides of your pie dish with one sheet of puff pastry. Trim the edges and fill in the gaps if any.
- Add the filling to the pie and spread out evenly. Create four deep wells in the filling to hold the eggs. Crack the raw eggs into the well and sprinkle each with a tiny amount of salt.
- Place the second sheet of puff pastry on top making sure it’s directly on top of the filling. Fold the edges over to seal the pie.
- Brush the top of the pie with a beaten egg then make a small cut in the middle of the pie with a sharp knife so steam can escape.
- Bake in the oven for 50 minutes then let cool completely before serving.
Nutrition
- I always use extra virgin olive oil in all of my recipes unless stated otherwise
- When I use canned or jarred tomatoes of any kind I always use Cirio or Mutti brands for the best results and flavour.
- All vegetables are medium sized unless stated otherwise
- All recipes are tested and developed using a fan (convection) oven
- Find out more about how nutrition is calculated.
- Check out our must have Italian Pantry Staples.
- You can also find all our Essential Kitchen Tools for Italian Cooking.
Duane Peters
Excellent recipe. I followed it without changes and it looks exactly like your picture. It is delicious.
Lucinda
So good and super easy to make! I made this for an Easter Sunday family lunch (as well as a beef wellington for the meat eaters) and it was so quick and easy to make. My 15 year old daughter helped and all 5 kids decorated the top with pastry leaves and flowers. Wish I had taken a pic but we were too busy eating it lol I really appreciate you including the metric measurements as I'm in Australia and if it's not metric I won't make it 🙂 This made the recipe very appealing and easy to use 🙂