These were the cookies growing up that really set our family Christmas cookies apart from the cookies you saw on other families’ tables. These are the cookies that my Nana made every year for my Pap who came here from Sicily when he was 3 years old because they were his absolute favorite. His most clear memory of his life in Sicily was sitting on the porch of his Nana, waiting for cookies. Perhaps the cookie he was waiting for was a Cuccidata, perhaps not. But I like to think it was. Sicilians are known for their love affair with sweets and make some of the best in the world.

The fig is so under-rated here in America. People just really don’t know what to do with figs. I am a huge lover of this sensual fruit. I have shown my adoration of it on pizza, on salad and even as a jam. It can be sweet, savory or in between. There are endless ways to use this beautiful fruit, but one of the best ways is in these cookies. Dried figs are mixed with raisins, a ground whole orange (peel and all) and walnuts to create a filling for one of the softest best smelling dough I have ever worked with. Then the fun part is in true colorful, Sicilian fashion, get crazy with the colors and decoration – colored icing, sprinkles and this year, chocolate really make each one of these cookies special. These cookies mean Christmas for the DiPiazza family. So I made these with my mom to honor the generations of DiPiazzas before us. Hope you enjoy!

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As everyone here knows, I am obsessed with figs and fig recipes. Their exterior beauty is exotic and captivating, while the soft, creamy sweet fruit on the inside is so unexpected. I just adore the fig and since summer is drawing to an end, I am posting two more fig recipes I think you will enjoy:
Parmesan Stuffed Figs with Balsamic Reduction and Drunken Figs.

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I saw a recipe for fresh fig pizza with blue cheese in Vegetarian Times years ago. I have a huge collection of recipes I have torn out of magazines and newspapers, printed from online, etc etc over the years. These are recipes that have given me inspiration on creating new flavors and dishes. Every time I move, which seems to have been quite a few times over these past few years, I go through the box and get rid of the ones I will never make or have lost their lustor.

This recipe has stuck with me over the years and I finally decided to try my version of it. As you know from my recent post about figs, fresh figs are finally in season and so I have been eating quite a lot of them! Since Roberto is always looking for a good ITALIAN pizza crust - (no New York style crust, here)– to no avail yet in a restaurant, we have been trying to devise our own. The secret to a great Italian pizza crust is of course the high temperatures in which they are quickly cooked. So I decided to finish the pizzas by grilling them off at the end, in a 600 F grill to get it to the right consistency. It definitely got the Roman’s seal of approval. I also drizzled the pizzas with olive oil and balsamic vinegar when they came out of the grill to give it a little something extra!
Buon Appetito!

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Now if this is not mouth watering, I really don’t know what is.
Have I mentioned how much I love figs? They are just so magnificent - They look like strange little pods from the outside, but when you open them up they are so lucious and delicate and gorgeous! They take my breath away! I love figs so much that to look at them in person makes my heart leap, my mouth water and my eyes to fill with tears…well at least that is what they did when I saw Sylvia’s Rocket Salad with Grilled Figs and Goat Cheese
a few weeks back. That was when I was beginning to despair about ever finding fresh figs again! Since we moved to Florida, it has been like acclimating to everything – the weather, the culture, the driving, and the availability of well-loved ingredients! I took for granted in the past the easy availability of certain favorite ingredients living in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast where there was always a plethora of ethnic markets, including Mediterranean. But having moved to Florida, I have had trouble finding things like, hazelnuts, pomegranate syrup and FRESH FIGS! So I began to loose hope of having fresh figs again and when fig season began and I saw recipes like the one on Sylvia’s blog I began to feel a little crushed and a deep longing for figs, glorious figs. My luck was about to change.
One day at the grocery store recently while I was perusing the tropical fruit aisle (one of the great things about moving to Florida – there is a tropical fruit aisle!) something I often do so I can try new and exotic fruits, I saw a little place card for fresh Turkish Figs and my broken heart began to mend! My beloved figs were there! Yes, they were $8 for about 10 of them, which I knew was ridiculous but at this point I was ready to throw caution to the wind, they were there and I wanted them! Once I brought them home I knew I needed to eat them fast – as they rot quickly! So I had two recipes in mind – Sylvia’s salad and Fresh Fig and Sage Grilled Pizza. Here is Sylvia’s Recipe as she posted it!
It is heavenly!

Stay tuned for the Pizza recipe!

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Prosciutto is a cured paper-thin ham. The most well known is the kind from the region of Parma in Italy. It can be used for sandwiches, in omelets, on pizza or in Antipasti (appetizers). In this recipe it is paired with fresh figs, a sweet, soft fruit found all over the Mediterranean region.
Serve this as an appetizer with some crusty bread and cheese, like a good parmigiano reggiano and a glass of wine.

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