Queen of sicilian pastry making, probably Cassata‘s name comes from Arabic qas’at, “basin”, maybe for its round shape, or from Latin caseum, cheese because it’s full of ricotta cheese. Its history is as mysterious as the history of foreign domination in Sicily.The Sicilian Cassata is the philosopher’s stone of Sicilian cakes, and along with the cannoli, it is known throughout the world. The etymology and history of this wonderful cake are magnificently described in the book “Mangiare di festa – Tradizioni e ricette della cucina Siciliana” : According to tradition, the happy bond ricotta cheese-sugar, which is the base of cassata, arised when it arrived the sweetness of brown sugar in Sicily. It is said that a “Saracen” was kneading those ingredients in a copper pot and answered “qas’at”, the Arabic name of the pot, to a Sicilian who had asked him, instead, the name of the cake ….
