Erbazzone reggiano

Bring about 5 l of water to the boil in a large pot with about 30 g of salt. It heats while you trim the greens.

Check At a full, rolling boil by the time the greens are washed.

Cut the base off the chard; keep the leaves and the tender part of the stalks, sliced across about 1 cm wide, and throw away any tough, stringy ends. Pick over the spinach, removing the roots and thick stems. Weigh them: about 1 kg of each. Wash both in several changes of cold water, lifting them out each time so the grit stays behind.

Check No grit at the bottom of the last rinsing water.

In the frying pan, melt the 80 g of finely chopped lardo over a medium-low heat. Add the onion, and the crushed garlic clove if you use it, and cook gently, stirring now and then, until soft and translucent. Take the pan off the heat until the greens are ready.

Check The lardo has melted and the onion is soft and translucent, pale gold at most, never brown.

Tip Keep the heat low: the onion should soften without browning.

Run cold water over the greens in the colander for a minute or so, until you can handle them. Then squeeze them hard, a handful at a time, until hardly any more water comes out.

Check A squeezed ball of greens no longer drips.

Chop the squeezed greens coarsely with a knife, then weigh them.

Check At least 650 g, so that the greens make up at least 60% of the filling. If you have less, blanch, cool and squeeze more spinach until the scale reaches it.

Season the cooked spinach and chard with the soffritto of onion and lardo, which may be flavoured to taste with garlic, parsley and pepper.

Check No liquid runs to the side when you tilt the pan: the greens look dry and glossy.

Tip Our guide: put the greens back over a medium heat with the soffritto and stir for about 10 minutes, until dry. Add salt at the end, a little at a time: the lardo and the Parmigiano are both salty.

Tip Our guide: take out the garlic clove; the parsley, if you use it, goes in later with the Parmigiano.

Off the heat, stir the 50 g of breadcrumbs into the hot greens. Spread the filling out on a large tray or dish, no more than 2 cm deep, to cool.

Check An even, thin layer, steaming freely.

Tip Our guide: the breadcrumbs go in while the greens are hot, the Parmigiano only once the filling is cool.

Put a shelf in the lower third of the oven and heat it to 200 °C, with top and bottom heat and no fan. It heats while you make the pastry and the pastry rests.

Check An oven thermometer reads 200 °C before the pie goes in.

Work the soft wheat flour, water, lard and salt together until the dough has the consistency you want.

Check Smooth, soft and even, not sticky; pressed with a finger, the dent fills back slowly.

Tip Our guide: rub the 30 g of lard into the 300 g of flour and 5 g of salt with your fingertips, pour in 130 g of water and mix, then knead on the board for 8–10 minutes.

Tip Our guide: add the last 10 g of water a spoonful at a time, only if the dough stays crumbly.

Put the tray of filling in the fridge, loosely covered, while the pastry rests.

Check In the fridge within about 20 minutes of leaving the pan.

Take the filling out of the fridge and stir in the 130 g of grated Parmigiano Reggiano, and the chopped parsley if you use it.

Check Cool to the touch, soft but dry: a squeezed spoonful leaves your fingers barely damp. It weighs about 1 kg–1.2 kg.

Tip Our guide: the specification wants the filling to weigh at least half the raw pie, so at least as much as all the pastry and lardo together, 515 g; this filling has room to spare.

Grease the low metal tin, about 24 cm × 34 cm and 3 cm deep, with a little lard.

Cut the pastry into two equal pieces, about 235 g–240 g each. On a lightly floured board, roll one out into a rectangle about 34 cm × 44 cm.

Check Measured with a ruler, it reaches about 34 cm × 44 cm: at that size it is about 1.3 mm thick.

Roll the sheet loosely round the pin, unroll it over the tin and ease it into the corners and up the sides, leaving the extra hanging over the rim.

Check Bottom and sides covered with no tears, a little hanging over the rim all round.

Spread the filling in a single layer on the thin pastry. The thickness of filling and pastry is up to you, as long as the filling is at least 50% of the weight of the raw pie.

Check An even layer about 1.5 cm deep, right into the corners.

Tip Our guide: level it with the back of a spoon without pressing it down.

Roll the second piece out thinner than the first, to about 38 cm × 48 cm.

Check Measured with a ruler, it reaches about 38 cm × 48 cm: at that size it is about 1.1 mm thick.

Dust the sheet lightly with flour and roll it loosely onto the floured pin, then gently push its two ends towards the middle of the pin so that it gathers into folds. Unroll it over the filling.

Check The whole filling covered by a sheet in soft folds.

Close the filling in at the edges, between the two layers of pastry.

Check A continuous pressed rim all round, with no gap where the filling shows.

Tip Our guide: trim both sheets level with the rim of the tin, then fold their edges inwards together over the filling and press them into a small rim, about 1.5 cm wide.

Prick the top sheet all over with a fork, about every 3 cm–4 cm.

Check Holes over the whole top, none missed in the corners.

Tip The holes let the steam out, which would otherwise break the pastry.

Scatter the top layer of pastry with lardelli, salted pork lardo.

Check Slivers spread evenly over the whole top.

Tip Our guide: the 40 g of lardo, cut into thin slivers about 3 cm long.

Cut it in the tin into squares or rectangles and serve it warm or at room temperature.

Tip Our guide: put leftovers in the fridge, covered, within 2 hours of baking, and eat them within 3 days, reheated in the oven to 75 °C in the centre.