Easter Pie

Jump to Recipe

Wheat Pie for Easter is a Neopolitan tradition.  There are different legends about why.  Some say the wheat represents the Resurrection.  Others believe it stems from the much-anticipated arrival of a grain ship during a famine.  I suppose both could be true.  

It’s a rich, fruity, creamy pie.  It’s a lot of work–and a lot of carbs.  But it lasts a few days; a small piece is very filling, and it’s only once a year.  

Notes on Ingredients for
Easter Wheat Pie

Pasta Frolla

This post contains affiliate links.  For more information, click here.  

Pasta frolla is the basic pastry dough for Italian baking.  My (grand-mother’s) recipe is here.  You can use regular American dough if you prefer, but pasta frolla is sweeter and fruitier and suits Easter wheat pie better.  You can freeze it ahead of time and thaw it in the fridge overnight.  The traditional top crust for Easter wheat pie is a diagonal criss-cross, but you can make a perpendicular lattice if you prefer.  I use a fluted pastry cutter, but a straight pizza wheel is fine.  

Ricotta

Use the best ricotta you can find and afford.  Some options:

• Making your own ricotta is surprisingly quick and easy.  Just be sure to drain it thoroughly.  I drain mine overnight in the fridge for Easter wheat pie.
• If you have a good Italian salumeria nearby, you can find fresh ricotta there.  
• The best pre-packaged ricotta I know is from Salvatore Bklyn.  If you live on the Eastern seaboard between southern Connecticut and northern Virginia, you may be able to order it from FreshDirect.  It’s pricey, but it’s a very dry ricotta, so it will save you draining time.  
• The best brick-and-mortar grocery-store ricotta I’ve found is Bel Gioioso.  My local Wegmans carries it, and you might be able to order it via Instacart.  

Wheat Berries

Wheat berries are whole wheat kernels.  They come hard or soft, red or white.  Use the soft, white ones for Easter wheat pie.  They can be pricey, but I’ve found decent ones on Amazon.  (And you can get 5 percent cash back if you use an Amazon credit card.) 

Alternatively, there is jarred wheat marketed specifically for Easter wheat pie.  It is called Grano Cotto per Pasteria (cooked grains for pasteria, what Neopolitans call Easter wheat pie).  You can find it at an Italian market or on Amazon.  

Candied Peels

Citron is a large, dry citrus fruit with a very thick rind.  Both candied citron peel and candied orange peel are available via Amazon, if you can’t find them at your local grocery store.  

Orange Water

Also called orange blossom water or orange floral water, it is distilled from orange blossoms and has a very light floral flavor.  If you have a Middle Eastern market nearby, you can probably find some there.  Otherwise, Nielsen Massey makes a good one; it’s pricey, but a bottle keeps for several years.  

I was lucky enough to know one of my Italian great-grandmothers, my French-Canadian great-grandmother, and both my grandmothers, as well as my mother.  Now that they’re all gone, it has been a wonderful project to make again the recipes they’ve left behind.  It makes me feel close to them again, and like I’m keeping part of them alive.  So far, none of their recipes has provided the scavenger-hunt for ingredients of Easter wheat pie.  But it’s worth it.  I hope you think so too.