Puff pastry and meringue log ("nunettine"?): What is it?

[Liana Krissoff]

In Trento, Italy, and then recently at a Korean bakery in Atlanta, I had a pastry that looked like this: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Kr5L0ScriBQ...

I don't know what they were called in Italy, but at the Korean place they were labeled "nunettine (crispy pie)." Many, many Internet searches over the years have yielded nothing other than the photo above, and I'd really like to make these. I seem to remember that in Italy they might have had apricot jam between the puff pastry bottom and the thin, crisp meringue top, but I could be misremembering. Any hints?

[Liana Krissoff]

I finally found out what it's called: sfogliantine glassate ("glazed" is the operative word here, I suppose). Glazed puff pastry. I found some Italian-language recipes online: http://dolcienonsolo.myblog.it/archive/2008/06/15/sfogliatine-glassate.html and http://www.cookaround.com/yabbse1/blog.php?b=26510

And I see on the packaging of commercial versions that it does indeed come with apricot jam or something, but I still don't know how exactly the jam gets in there. It's probably just a very thin layer of it on top of the pastry and beneath the glaze. I plan to try it tomorrow.

http://www.amazon.com/Sfogliatine-Gla...

[Liana Krissoff]

Okay, if anyone is still interested, I've posted a picture of my (gloriously messy) success here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lianakri...

Thanks for all your help. Finally getting this right, after all this time (five years, off and on, I've been searching for clues about this pastry), I feel very satisfied and good . . . if a little directionless.

[Gio]

Brava Liana! I've been following your thread with interest because I don't think I've ever seen or tasted anything like those pastries.

[todao]

I know of an Austrian, German, Russian, confection that fits your description. It's commonly known as Schaumrolle.
There are many variations on this one. Here's an image of one of them.

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=h...

[Liana Krissoff]

Those Schaumrolle look delicious, but they're not quite what I'm looking for. I should've been more detailed in my description. The pastries I'm thinking of are flat-ish rectangles of puff pastry topped with a thin layer of crisp, golden brown, cracked meringue. At least I think it's meringue. The topping is very sweet, and it almost breaks off and separates from the puff pastry as you bite into it. In the cracks in the top you can see some darker caramelized sugar. The topping kind of melts in your mouth as a meringue would. There's no other flavoring—except, again, in the Italian version, where I thought there was apricot jam between the layers. I could've been mistaking the caramelized sugar for something else, though.

[todao]

From your description I'm getting the image of a Strudel. The images on the blog appear to be made with phyllo dough. I recall your post, a while back, on the same subject. I wasn't able to locate anything then. Let's keep trying.
Odd that you'd find something in a Korean bakery that you experienced in Italy. Is it an Italian bakery run by Koreans or a Korean pastry you found in Italy?
Pate a Choux or Roulade?
How about this?
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_IAi1kxmR89I...

[toveggiegirl]

I don't know what this is, but I'm wondering if the caramelized sugar may actually be chestnut paste. I'm going to try to look into this more because you've piqued my curiosity!

[todao]

Nice to have someone else get involved in the search. The whole thing is beginning to make me believe we're working with a toasted meringue or divinity glazed baklava with apricot filling.

[Liana Krissoff]

Oh, did I already ask about this? I'm so sorry to have repeated my query, but I still have no good leads and this is driving me crazy.

The Korean bakery where I found this was actually the bakery section of the Super H Mart, the big Korean supermarket in Duluth, Georgia. Some of the baked goods for sale there are Asian-esque, red bean paste things, etc.; some are just standard cakes and cookies. Except for this "nunettine"!

It's not like baklava, not phyllo: Definitely puff pastry. Not very rich-tasting or heavy; it's lightweight and sweet and crisp. There's no "filling," per se, and in the "Korean" version nothing resembling jam of any sort—it was just puff pastry with what appeared to be meringue on top (pretty sure it was not chestnut paste, but a very thin, crackly, crisp layer of meringue), and it looked like the sugar had caramelized in the cracks.

Okay, my mom just sent me a recipe for something she calls "linzer fingers." I haven't tried the recipe yet, but if I substituted puff pastry for the cookie layer, and left out the almonds and extract, it might work:

Frozen Linzer Fingers

I freeze large squares of this; cut frozen bars into very narrow long “fingers.” Great with hot tea. Use any kind of jam (blackberry and raspberry are good), but always use almonds.

2 ½ cups all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

2 sticks soft butter (1 cup)

2 egg yolks

1 ½ cups berry jam or preserves

4 egg whites

¾ cup sugar

1 ½ cups finely ground almonds

¼ teaspoon almond extract

Mix the flour and 1 cup sugar together in a large bowl. With a pastry blender (or your fingers) mix the soft butter and yolks into the flour/sugar mixture until it is smooth. Generously butter a jelly roll pan and spread the dough evenly onto the pan. Prick the dough all over with a fork. Bake @ 350 for 14 minutes. Cool.

Spread the jam or preserves evenly over the cooled cookie layer.

In a medium bowl stiffly beat the 4 egg whites, gradually adding the ¾ cups sugar, continuing to beat until very stiff. Gently fold in the almonds and extract. Spread over the jam/preserves layer. Bake @ 350 until the top is slightly brown, about 18 minutes. Cool and cut into squares or fingers.