Although I’ve lived in the UK since I was a year old, I was actually born in Italy. So, for this post, I’m bringing you a romantic love story that led to the invention of a cake/bread that's eaten in every Italian home over the festive period. There are various versions of the story, but this is my favourite.
Once there lived a handsome young nobleman from Milan called Ughetto Atellani who fell in love with a beautiful baker’s daughter called Adalgisa. He would fly his falcons near to the baker’s shop to watch her at work. Eventually, unable to watch her work so hard for so little, he disguised himself and offered to work for the baker for free. Unimpressed by the coarse fare and wanting to impress her, he sold his falcons to buy fine flour and eggs, dried and candied fruits and invented a wonderful butter-bread which soon became famous and made the baker very successful. Ughetto removed his disguise and asked for and won Adalgina’s hand in marriage. The wedding was said to have been arranged by the Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, and attended by Leonardo Da Vinci himself.
The cake-bread was eaten at the wedding and became known as Pan-de-Ton, which means bread of luxury in the local dialect. Today we call it panettone and you’ll see them either boxed, or wrapped in cellophane and be-ribboned, in delis and supermarkets at Christmas time. They’re often given as gifts on visiting during the festive season in Italy.
Here’s a picture of what they look like...
If you want to have a go at making one there are quite a few recipes to be found online, but the commercially-made ones are quite delicious. Go for a good-quality one if you want to try them and if you fancy giving one as a gift, they come in various wrappings and fancy tins. A good Italian deli will have a great selection this time of the year. I love it. I love Stollen, too, but that’s another blog post.
Do you have a favourite traditional Christmas food?
I loved that story! And the cake looks Delicious. To enter today's contest, just answer Candy/alexandra's question...or just say Hi. For extra entries, Like/friend Candy on Facebook and Twitter.
Up for grabs today: Kallysten's: CheckMate, Lily Graison's: A Touch of Heaven, Candy Nicks: Can I Keep You
The Winner of yesterday's contest was... entry#9 Tammi Hagberg!
11 comments:
That was such a sweet story Candy! And I've tried that bread before, it is sweet. My husband is French and when we visit at Christmas his mum always has it at home.
My favorite Christmas food has got to be my mum's sausage stuffing. Yum!! We always fight over it. lol
OH, I love Christmas stuffing. (No innuendo intended, oh well, maybe a very small one.)
I can't say this is a traditional Christmas food, but I love eggnog. It's only out where I live between Thanksgiving and New Year, so I consider it a Christmas food. I usually add some Kahlua to it. That just makes it more yummy.
It's not a tradional Christmas cookies, per se, but every year I make my family the Italian Tri-color (rainbow) cookies. The recipe has alot of steps to it and takes a long time, but it is worth it...they are delicious.
Every year me and my girls make rum truffles and cut some white icing and icing 'holly' to make them look like christmas puddings, it takes us ages, makes a right mess of the kitchen, but we love it and have great fun.
we usually have turkey and cornbread dressing. the best part i think is just being with family. i had a health scare recently and it made me realize what is important. family. they help you through the tough times.
Joanne, I always think of eggnog as a Christmassy food, too. Not traditional in the UK, but I might have a go at making some this year.
Denise, those cookies sound good. I'll look them up.
Midnight Marie, rum truffles, yum, and making a mess is half the fun.
Anon - hope everything is okay with you now. I agree with your comment, family is so important.
My family have a favourite Christmas biscuit that the children used to call Spartacus biscuits. They are rightfully called Spekulatius and are a wonderful German spiced biscuit that they loved to eat whilst watching reruns of Spartacus :D
Dont really have fave dishes but i will take naything chocolate
I know that it is the butt of all sorts of jokes but I still like Christmas fruit cake.
I am just not sure what it would be... Hummmm
Well we have dressing for Thanksgiving and Christmas and it something I love to eat it. So I guess that is my favorite thing to eat. Its home made and its the cornbread dressing.
Candy I loved this sweet tale of love and think it's wonderful to have as part of a holiday tradition.
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