Pastéis de Gila—Spaghetti Squash Pastry
I was introduced to figleaf gourd on my first trip to Portugal many years ago. There, they call it gila or chila. At a local pastry shop in Sintra, I ate one of my favorite Portuguese pastries, pastéis de gila, which is a buttery flaky pastry filled with figleaf gourd jam. I instantly fell in love with it and could never stop thinking about it even after I came home.
Figleaf gourd doesn’t have that much of a taste on its own. It is mildly sweet and somehow tastes faintly similar to zucchini. Since it is neutral tasting, it will taste more like whatever you season it with. The main charm, however, is the texture of the flesh. It looks like strands of angel hair pasta.
In the Netherlands, I have never seen figleaf gourds. A good substitute is spaghetti squash, which is in abundance this season. As the name says, the flesh looks like strands of spaghetti instead of angel hair pasta.
The skin of figleaf gourd and spaghetti squash is very hard. Don’t even try to cut it with a knife or you risk hurting yourself. One of the most common ways is to throw the gourd/ squash on the ground so it breaks apart. I find this way too messy. For me, the easiest and the least messy way is to bake the gourd/ squash whole first and then cut it after it is half-baked. The heat will soften the skin, making it very easy to cut the gourd/ squash.
After scraping the flesh out of the skin, you need to candy it. You will get quite a lot of candied squash/ jam, so the next step is your call. You can either use the whole jam to make pastéis, or you can transfer the rest into a clean jar and use it as a spread (so good on top of toast and cream cheese!).
Traditionally, people use lemon peel and a bit of cinnamon—1 stick for the whole pot, so the cinnamon flavor is mild. However, in my recipe, I used 2 cinnamon sticks, cloves, orange peel, and juice. I love cinnamon and I want the flavor to be a bit more prominent rather than just subtly exist in the background. I was actually thinking of using lemon, but I forgot to buy it and just happened to have 1 orange at home. That single orange actually saved my day because I think it tastes even better with it instead of lemon!
This recipe is very easy, and you can even make both the jam and pastries in advance. What I usually do is, I make the jam a day before or so. Then I make the pastries the next days and freeze half of them. Whenever I have a dinner party, I can simply pop them in the oven.
Happy baking and I’ll see you in the next newsletter!
Yields 10-15 pastries
Preparation time: 45 minutes
Cooking time: 2 hours
Level of difficulty: 1/3
Keep for 2 days at room temperature or freeze the unbaked pastries for up to 1 month
Ingredients:
10-15 puff pastry sheets (approximately 11x11 cm or 4x4 inches/ 45g or 1.5 ounces each)
1 egg yolk, whisked
25g/ ¼ cup almond flakes
Doce de gila (Figleaf gourd jam)
1 figleaf gourd or spaghetti squash, about 1.2 kg/ 42 ounces
500g/ 2 cups water
500g/ 2½ cups sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
3 cloves
Zest and juice from 1 orange
Steps:
Preheat the oven to 200°C/ 400°F. Prick the gourd/ squash with a fork all around. Put it in a tray, pop it in the oven, and bake it for 45 minutes.
Take the gourd out of the oven and let it cool a bit for 10-15 minutes. Then, cut it in half and scrape the flesh out of the skin with a fork.
Put water and sugar in a big pot and cook them until the sugar is melted. Add the gourd/ squash flesh, cinnamon sticks, and cloves. Stir to combine.
Cook it for about 30 minutes until the gourd/ squash thickens and changes color into dark orange. Don’t forget to stir occasionally so it doesn’t burn. Add the orange zest and juice and cook it for 10 minutes further. You can transfer it into clean jars and let it cool down before storing it.
To make the pastéis, preheat the oven to 200°C/ 400°F. On a baking sheet layered with parchment paper, lay a sheet of puff pastry. Add about 1½ heaping spoons of squash jam in the middle, leaving about 1 cm of border. Brush the border with egg wash and fold the top of the pastry sheet so it covers the jam entirely. Seal the edge using a fork. Brush the top of the pastry with egg wash and sprinkle with almond flakes. Put them in the oven and bake for 15-20 minutes until the pastry is crispy and golden brown. Let it cool a bit before you eat it—be careful, the filling is piping hot!
Tips: These pastries freeze well for up to a month. When you want to bake them, do not defrost them. Bake them directly in the preheated oven.