Cheese-Stuffed Pasta from Astypalaia

TRADITIONALLY prepared during Carnival, on the last weekend before Lent, this unusual stuffed pasta is shaped like old-fashioned hard candy wrapped in cellophane, with the two ends twisted. The local goat’s milk cheese is the base for the filling, which is seasoned with the wild saffron threads that the women gather in the mountains of the island. Frosso Podotas, who owns an old grocery store near the medieval castle of Astypalaia, gave me her recipe. Ricotta, mixed with cheddar and manouri