pastry

Cantalamessa, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Fave dei Morti: Almond biscuits – Chestnuts and Truffles TV

A repost of a popular video I made a few years back to show how they celebrate November 2 in Umbria.   These almond biscuits from Umbria are traditionally served on November 2, the feast of All Souls day, hence the name which means beans of the dead. Fave dei Morti Ingredients 250g (2 2./3 …

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Patience rewarded!: Amo Venezia (review)

Last year, you may remember, I was in Padua searching for its most famous traditional cake whilst waiting for the rain to stop. It was almost impossible to find the pazientina but a long search led me to one of the last patisseries still making it and the only one I could find. Imagine my surprise …

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An Italian croissant?

  It has become one of my fundamental beliefs that you cannot find croissants in Italy. There are things that look like croissants, usually called brioche or cornetti, served up and down the country for breakfast in bars, but buy one and you will soon discover the difference between these sweetmeats and the traditional salt-and-butter …

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Piazza delle erbe padova

Being patient in Padua

  I think it was Woody Allen in his film Midnight in Paris who said that Paris was the only city in the world more beautiful in the rain. Well, unfortunately I wasn’t in Paris last weekend but in Padua and there was a lot of rain. Padua (or Padova as it’s called in Italian) is …

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pastciccio di tortellini

Pasticcio di tortellini: tortellini pie from Modena

Ever since I came back from Modena, I’ve been dreaming of this pie. Having grown up in England, I love big, traditional, English pies such as pork pies and the game pies you see in TV costume dramas weighing down many a seventeenth-century table. This is the closest thing I’ve found in Italian cuisine to …

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