Three-Cheese Calzones
The word Calzone means "sock" but for me looks like a big pillow. My question was what should be in the pillow. Cheese, of course. Anything else? I checked a recipe from Lidia's Italian-American Kitchen that called for ricotta, mozzarella, leek, and spinach. Spinach seemed one of traditional ingredients in Calzones, but didn't attract me this time. Didn't want too meaty like ham and salami, nor any chunky vegetables, such as green bell peppers or mushrooms this time. But just cheese sounded too plain...
After debating myself, I decided to use a little bit of diced panscetta cooked until fat rendered, caramelized onions, a little of garlic, ricotta, mozzarella, parmigiano-reggiano, chopped fresh parsley, and generous fresh grounded pepper. Actually I debated myself again which one would be the best among onion, leek, scallion and shallot... Without any strong reasons, I picked onion because there was half an onion leftover in the fridge, and I remembered onions were usually in Sugo all'amatriciana along with panscetta. Onion must be fine with panscetta. By the way, the pasta sauce was traditionally made with guanciale (pork jowl) but commonly used panscetta (pork belly) because guanciale was too fatty.
One more thing: tomato sauce was supposed to be on side. I quickly made marinara sauce, which was strangely sweet. I believe it was due to the canned crushed tomato. I had never bought the brand's canned crushed tomato before but knew the brand had received good reviews. The ingredient label on the can didn't say "sugar," so tomatoes must have been somehow so sweet. Well, now I learned. I added one J's dried red chile pepper that made the sauce spicy. Although the heat didn't offset the sweetness, J appreciated the nice kick.
Three-Cheese Calzones
MAKES 2
2 balls pizza dough (I followed Lidia's recipe and divided the dough in half to make two dough balls.)
Filling
3 oz panscetta, small diced
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1 tsp garlic, minced
15 oz ricotta cheese (wrap in paper towel and drain liquid as much as possible)
8 oz fresh mozzarella, diced
1/4 cup parmigiano-reggiano, grated
3 tbs fresh parsley, chopped
fresh grounded black pepper
1. Prepare pizza dough, keep in refrigerator until assembling calzones
2. For filling, heat a little of olive oil, cook panscetta over mid-low heat, until fat renders, transfer on the paper towel, set aside
3. In a clean pan, heat 1 tbs olive oil, cook onion with a pinch of salt over mid-low heat until soften and lightly browned, add garlic, cook about 1 min, transfer to a bowl, cool to room temperature.
4. Add panscetta, ricotta, mozzarella, parmigiano in the bowl, mix well, add parsley and generous grounded black pepper.
5. To assemble calzones, roll one pizza dough ball out to about 1/4 inch thick, spread half of the filling mixture in the dough, seal the edges firmly by plaiting the edges with fingers, brash the top with egg-water-mixture (option). Repeat to make one more.
6. Bake 450 F, about 25 min.
