Torta Pasqualina

Torta Pasqualina is labor. There is no other way to say it. Ligurian women once stretched thirty-three layers of dough, one for each year of Christ's life, each sheet so thin you could read a letter through it. They did this on wooden boards in cramped kitchens, working by feel, their hands knowing when the dough had reached the point of transparency.

I will not pretend you must make thirty-three layers. Six to eight, properly thin and properly oiled, will give you the crisp, shattering crust that defines this pie. What I will not permit is the substitution of frozen puff pastry. That is not Torta Pasqualina. That is something else wearing its name.

The filling matters as much as the crust. Prescinsêua, the curdled milk cheese of Liguria, is traditional but nearly impossible to find outside Genoa. Good ricotta, well-drained, serves honorably. The greens should be chard or a mixture of wild herbs if you can find them. Spinach is acceptable. The marjoram is not negotiable. This herb defines Ligurian cooking, and without it you have lost the soul of the dish.

The eggs go in whole, nestled into wells pressed into the filling, where they bake until the whites set but the yolks remain soft and golden. When you cut the first slice and see that perfect yolk, you will understand why Ligurian families have made this pie for Easter since at least the sixteenth century.