Seadas (Sardinian Honey and Cheese Pastries)

Author Notes

Of all the uniquely Sardinian dishes, this is probably the best known on the rest of the Italian peninsula. Somewhat a pastry, somewhat savoury, it could hold its own as an entree but it's actually a surprising dessert – crisp, deep fried pastry filled with lemony, oozing cheese and soaked in warm honey.

Known in dialect as seadas (or, depending on which part of the island you may be, sebadas) were traditionally eaten around Easter or Christmas but now found year round. The main ingredients that set this pastry apart are undoubtedly the local Pecorino cheese and the local honey and their delicate balance – both important products in this region's cuisine.

The cheese typically used for these pastries is a very fresh, young Pecorino – a sheep's milk cheese in its early stages when still soft and slightly acidic, rather than hard and salty. It's unsurprising, then, to know that this dish's origins are in the pastoral areas of Sardinia's fertile centre and north-west, where shephards led their grazing sheep and would bring home this fresh cheese to prepare this dish.

The simple pastry is a rustic one, made with flour (or semolina) and water, with a bit of lard added to soften it to a silky smooth and quite elastic dough. Cut into rounds, the dough, like a large, round raviolo, sandwiches the cheese, which is melted down and infused with lemon zest, then cooled and cut into perfect rounds to fit the pastry. The seada is deep fried in olive oil and served piping hot with warm Sardinian honey generously drizzled over the top – the result is a honey-soaked crisp pastry, with melting, delicately lemon flavoured cheese. Quite a superb way to end a meal.

If you can't get hold of a young Pecorino for this, it would be quite unorthodox, but go for a soft, young asiago or something delicately, slightly acidic. In some of the island's variations, you may find, less commonly, ricotta in place of the Pecorino, powdered sugar in place of the honey or orange zest in place of the lemon.

For the most similar results to a real Sardinian seada, try an orange blossom honey or a wild herb honey, such as thyme. Some prefer the slight bitterness of a chestnut honey. —Emiko