Desserts and I aren’t the best of friends. My sweet tooth is quite a lot smaller than most and as far as cooking goes, I tend to prefer savoury for three good reasons.

1) Cooking sweets is more science than creativity. Measurements must be precise; a slosh of this and a drizzle of that could ruin the whole thing.

2) There’s no tasting as you go which means it can take hours to create something that you don’t know isn’t going to work until the end.

3) I’m not sure it’s ever good to know how much butter really goes into the base of a cheesecake.

Having said all of that, there is one sweet treat I couldn’t resist attempting … crumbly and delicious crostole! For the unacquainted, crostole is a traditional Italian dessert: basically ribbons of sweet fresh pasta that are deep-fried and dusted with lots of icing sugar, and they were made by my grandmother for every big fat Italian family gathering we ever had growing up. I spied the recipe in Mangia Mangia by Teresa Oates and Angela Villella (Lantern, $40) and couldn’t wait to try it out. 
           

Making the sweet pasta is the same as savoury, except for adding some lemon and orange zest, a little vermouth and orange juice. I had two problems – I didn’t want to buy a whole bottle of vermouth for the mere teaspoon required, and in my haste to start kneading, I also forgot to add the orange juice. Hmmm, maybe that’s where the term sweet revenge comes from. Nothing to do but press on.

After rolling out the dough, and cutting it with a squiggly cutter into 4cm ribbons, I have to admit an embarrassingly strong desire to high-five myself after I mastered the knack of folding the dough through a slit in the middle to create the bow-shape. Like a five-year-old child learning to write I pulled my husband into the kitchen and proudly pointed at my creation: “Look what I did!” He was impressed.
           

Not a big deep-fryer, this process was also a bit of a challenge. It started off well, frothing and turning golden in a few minutes, but the browning seemed to speed up progressively, which didn’t seem to be leaving the crostole long enough to cook. After draining them on paper towel I impatiently watched them as they cooled, dusted them in icing sugar and had my first taste. I’m not sure I got the texture quite right (a little dry), but perhaps this had to do with my deep-frying technique or the missing orange juice. But they still had a deliciously zesty flavour and we quickly inhaled most of a plate with an afternoon coffee. This is one sweet I’m determined to master next time.