Take your first ball and roll out to a 10 cm × 15 cm (4 in × 6 in) oval,
around 5 mm (¼ in) thick – it must be thick to insulate the custard as it
bakes. Spoon (or pipe) a heaped tablespoonful–sized blob of custard
(25–30 g/1 oz) onto the top end of the oval, then spoon a teaspoonful
of the marmalade on top (if using). It will feel like a lot of custard, but
you can seal it in. Use less on your first batch to gain confidence.

There is a little extra custard in case you roll into trouble.

Fold the bottom of the dough oval up and over the custard blob. With
both sets of fingertips, gently press the dough at the edge of the
custard blob to form a pert mound. After this point is secure, keep
pressing around the mound, enclosing the filling snugly, retaining the
custard dome and being careful not to smoosh the custard out
the sides. It will look like a ravioli with a well-sealed pastry skirt.

Manage the dough temperature carefully: cracks can form on top while
assembling if the dough is too cool and inflexible. If this happens, don’t
dismay or discard. We can cover it with icing sugar later.

I don’t use an egg wash to seal this, as it would make the re-rolled dough
streaky. The dough smooshes together beautifully as long as you don’t over- flour
it, and brush any excess off before assembly.

Take an 8 cm (3¼ in) fluted cookie cutter, dip it in flour and position
the cutter so the mound is EXACTLY in the centre. Stamp and remove
the excess dough, keeping it aside to make up two more 80 g (2¾ oz)
pieces of dough for the last two genovesi.

If you filled with ease and have clean offcuts, you can get eleven genovesi.

Lift the genovesi off the work surface (use a lifter if they are stuck),
pinch the top and bottom lightly around the edge one last time to
reinforce the seal, then place on the baking tray.

Keep rolling and filling and cookie cutter-ing until you have ten or
eleven (maximum) completed genovesi. Poke a hole in the top of
each one with a wooden skewer. Chill the completed cookies for
30 minutes, and while they rest, preheat your oven to 130°C (265°F).

Bake the cookies for 25 minutes until the genovesi have a very pale
brown edge.* The mounds should be the palest gold and matt dry –
not moist and raw. The tops may crack a little during the bake – this
just adds a little character, and they will mostly settle and close up
upon cooling. The bottoms should be pale brown too.

Remove from the oven and cool for at least 30 minutes before
finishing with a blizzard of icing sugar and eating.

Adaptrix
Any given citrus
Tangelos, orange, or even lemon
can stand in for the mandarin. Put
the matching zest in the dough and
be mindful of size. One tangelo will
yield as much zest and juice as two
small mandarins.

* If the genovesi split and ooze custard
while baking, I let them finish baking
and then trim off the overflow. Still
heavenly!