Ferrara Bakery has been open for over 130 years and these Rainbow Cookies are their signature. They are made from 7 layers of cake, apricot jam and chocolate and sliced to look like the Italian flag.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Hi, I'm Ernest Lepore.
00:07 We're at Ferrara Bakery,
00:09 which is heaven in New York's heart of Little Italy.
00:12 And I'm fourth generation and the executive pastry chef.
00:16 - Hi, I'm Adeline Lepore Sessa.
00:18 I'm also part of the fourth generation.
00:20 We have five generations going.
00:22 Currently, it's my brother and myself.
00:25 My son runs our factory and my nephew
00:28 is the general manager of the store right now.
00:31 So Ferrara's is the oldest Italian pasticceria,
00:35 which means bakery pastry,
00:37 and expresso bar in the United States.
00:41 - Tricolore, rainbow cookies.
00:43 Tricolore in Italy means the flag.
00:46 So if you ask for a tricolore in Italy,
00:47 they're not gonna bring you cookies,
00:48 they're gonna bring you an Italian flag.
00:49 Here we understand it as this great cookie.
00:52 It's three cakes made to be one cookie,
00:56 which makes it so special.
00:58 (upbeat music)
01:00 Today we're gonna make tricolore rainbow cookies.
01:03 And we're gonna use macaroon paste.
01:06 And you can see, I like it smooth and at room temperature.
01:09 Macaroon paste is very interesting.
01:12 It comes from the apricot, which has a stone pit.
01:16 In the center of the apricot is a kernel.
01:19 And you know, the Italians, nothing go to waste.
01:21 So they crack this,
01:23 and then they put it through these pulverized granite wheels
01:26 and they make this paste.
01:28 And then this has so much almond paste in it.
01:31 But if you smell it, it's the real deal.
01:34 You can smell the apricot almond in it.
01:37 And as you see me working with it, it's soft.
01:40 And then the best quality butter we can buy,
01:42 shortening, sugar, fresh whole eggs, flour,
01:46 and then we have some green and red color.
01:50 So we're gonna mix and we're gonna cream
01:51 with our beautiful batter.
01:55 We're gonna mix them in that order.
01:57 So we're gonna cream the macaroon paste,
01:59 which has so much almond in it.
02:01 Then we're gonna add the butter.
02:03 Then we're gonna add the shortening.
02:04 And then the sugar is gonna make it nice and creamy.
02:09 Then we're gonna add our eggs.
02:11 And then our flour.
02:15 And it's gonna come together beautifully.
02:17 - And it's important that if you come here today,
02:21 you came here in five years or five years ago,
02:23 that it tastes exactly the same.
02:25 We do not compromise on the quality of our ingredients.
02:30 - Then we're gonna put it in three bowls
02:36 and we're gonna divide it equally.
02:37 Just has to be equal.
02:39 And then we're gonna put our green
02:40 and we're gonna put our red.
02:42 (upbeat music)
02:44 Getting the colors right.
02:57 My sister would tell me, guys are a little colorblind.
03:00 You gotta really be on the red and your green.
03:03 It's not pink.
03:04 It's not light green.
03:05 Bringing it all together,
03:06 creaming the macaroon paste and the almond paste
03:09 and the sugar.
03:11 And then you can all blow it on the color.
03:13 - My version of baby pink
03:15 and the baker's version of baby pink is always different.
03:19 So I use a Pantone chart
03:21 to show them the color pink I am talking about.
03:24 - And then you can make me a sample.
03:25 So we'll make sure we're on the same page.
03:28 So we're gonna have a green, a plain,
03:30 which is a white and a red.
03:32 And that's how we're gonna pan them and create our cookies.
03:36 (upbeat music)
03:38 So we're gonna put them in the oven for 350
04:01 for approximately 40 minutes
04:03 until they're golden, but not burnt.
04:05 No bubbles.
04:06 And then they're gonna come out
04:07 and they're gonna keep cooking in the pan
04:09 'cause the pan's warm.
04:11 When we took it out of the oven,
04:12 we're gonna put a very, very thin coat,
04:14 a skim coat of apricot marmalade.
04:18 And then we're gonna fold one onto the other.
04:20 (upbeat music)
04:23 (upbeat music)
04:25 So after we fill the cookie,
04:44 we're gonna put a weight on it,
04:45 compress it and let it rest for 24 hours.
04:48 Then we're gonna pour chocolate over it
04:51 and spread it out, let it set.
04:53 Really, we do a first foundational coat of chocolate
04:57 and a second coat of pretty chocolate.
04:59 So we get rid of the craters.
05:01 (upbeat music)
05:03 Chocolate on the top, chocolate on the bottom, seven layers.
05:19 (upbeat music)
05:22 After it's all built and it's all chocolate
05:28 and we space it so we can cut logs,
05:31 we're gonna turn it 90 degrees
05:32 and then cut each individual cookie.
05:35 And this is our famous Ferrara tri-calori cookies,
05:39 seven layer cookies.
05:41 - So Ferrara was incorporated in 1892,
05:48 although we were incorporated even before New York City,
05:51 because back then you didn't have to be incorporated.
05:54 It was our great, great uncle, Antonio Ferrara
05:57 and our great grandfather, Enrico Scoppa,
06:00 they were partners.
06:01 So Ferrara's has been here the whole 131 years
06:05 in the same building.
06:07 At one time, our factory was part of this whole entire block
06:11 but obviously New York real estate is just so expensive
06:15 that we have another 36,000 square foot facility
06:20 in New Jersey.
06:21 - Our memories really start when we get up in the morning.
06:24 We'd have to wait for our father on the steps
06:27 to come to work.
06:28 And if we weren't ready for my dad,
06:30 he left without us and we would cry.
06:32 That was the wrap Sunday packages.
06:34 - And it's a place where our family always met
06:38 and all different Italians would come to Little Italy
06:41 'cause they would have country men that they could speak to
06:44 and they would feel like they were in part of their country.
06:47 - Going into October, November, December,
06:54 we have the fall lineup,
06:57 which is the harvest of the planet.
06:59 So the Panettone, the struffoli.
07:02 - People love the struffoli so much.
07:05 We only used to make it at Christmas
07:07 'cause it was a Christmas item.
07:08 Now we make it for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter.
07:12 Just because people desire it so much.
07:16 Ferrara's is magical during the holidays.
07:20 Our room is dressed up.
07:22 And right after Thanksgiving,
07:23 our whole ceiling is decorated.
07:25 - It's really special.
07:27 But I really like to keep Christmas
07:29 through to January 6th, the Epiphany.
07:32 That's when the Italians give their gifts.
07:33 And then we discuss how do we make it more special?
07:36 - You know, and people come here for Christmas.
07:39 There's Christmas season for the Panettone.
07:42 The struffoli, the tricolor cookie.
07:45 - The Tironi.
07:46 - The Tironi, that's very specific to the holiday.
07:50 Though they're always here for the Lapsatile,
07:53 the cannoli, the New York cheesecake, our gelato.
07:57 - We ship on average 4,000 packages a day.
08:02 We're not happy unless there's 50,000 packages
08:05 for Christmas, 75,000 packages.
08:08 I keep saying, "Build another shipping table."
08:10 So I love this time of year because there's spice cookies,
08:14 there's sesame cookies, there's almond cookies,
08:17 fig cookies.
08:18 300 pans a day, 'cause it's three layers,
08:22 make 100 finished, which is 18 and a half pounds.
08:27 So on a good day, if I get to make 2,000 pounds
08:30 of rainbow for the day, but it takes another day
08:33 to cut them and such, I'm happy.
08:38 - Every day, we try to figure out
08:40 how can we even have more fun with this?
08:42 We're the real deal.
08:44 For the authentic Ferrara recipe,
08:47 which dates more than 130 years,
08:50 we're not satisfied until all the world
08:53 eats a Ferrara tricolor.
08:54 - Today was a good day when every customer
08:56 leaves here happy.
08:58 (upbeat music)
09:00 (upbeat music)
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