A quick lesson here in some of the Italian language, as an acquaintance on the way to better cooking. (Plus, Italian just sounds so delicious.)
In English, when we wish to say something is big or small, we use those very adjectives, as in “no big deal.” In Italian, you can do that, too. (There’s a line of wines, for example, labeled “Gran Passione.”) But more often, an Italian will append a suffix to a noun to say that a thing is bigger or smaller than its root.
Diminutive suffixes include “-etto” and “-ino”; the most common augmentative suffix is “-one” (pronounced, in Italian, “oh-nay”).
So, “spago,” the word for “string,” gives us “spaghetto” (singular, “little string”) or, as we know the name of the pasta in the plural, spaghetti, “little strings.” A thicker version of spaghetti is spaghettoni, or “bigger little strings.”
My favorite long-form noodle is bucatini, from “buca” for “hole” and the adjective “bucato,” holed (or, more properly, “bored,” as in hollowed out, like a tunnel). Bucatini are noodles with little bored-out tunnels. I like bucatini because it delivers on a particularly pleasurable version of “al dente.” Some of the boiling water snuggles in via the bore and cooks the noodle simultaneously from both inside as well as outside the pasta.
Many more forms of pasta, long and short, use either a diminutive or augmentative suffix to get at the meaning of the shape: orecchiette (from “orecchio,” ear, hence “small ears”); rigatoni (from “rigato,” ruled or furrowed, or “big furrowed ones”); or tortellini (from “torta,” cake or pie, hence “tortello,” small pie,” to tortellini, “very small pies”).
Christmastime in Italy is the season of the panettone, a wonderful sweet cake that gets its name from all the way back to the Latin for bread, “panis.” Then to the Italian “pane” (bread), and “panetto” (little bread, roll, or sometimes cake), to “panettone,” or “rather big cake,” but not merely in size (although it typically is that), but in importance, richness, nobility.
Panettone originated in Italy’s Lombardy region, specifically the capital city there, Milan. In contradistinction to the cooking of the historically less wealthy, less profligate South (with the notable outlier of Sicily), the list of panettone’s ingredients is like the contents of a safe-deposit box: wheat (instead of millet or barley, as in the South), eggs, raisins, candied fruit (using that rare-in-its-time commodity, sugar), yeast (as opposed to a sourdough starter that’s been in a farmer’s family forever), butter (versus olive oil), and even saffron, if you really wanted to splurge. (No saffron in the South.)
In addition, a good panettone takes two to three days to make (a couple of lengthy risings explain that), whereas a loaf of simple peasant bread is merely that day’s work.
Panettone gets its exalted status because it started out that way. Adding eating it on the occasion of the birth of the Christ Child is a fillip.
Panettone Bread Pudding
Panettones that include chocolate pieces don’t do as well in this recipe as the more traditional sort, that is, one with raisins and candied fruit pieces only. Serves 8-12.
Ingredients
- 1 panettone, 2 pounds minimum, torn into 1-inch or slightly larger pieces
- 4 large eggs
- 8 egg yolks
- 5 cups half and half
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup light brown sugar
- 3-4 tablespoons unsalted butter or ghee, softened
Directions
Place the shredded panettone on a large cookie sheet that has been lined with parchment paper and brown the pieces in a 350-degree oven until slightly dried out but not toasted, at least 15 minutes. Set aside to dry further.
In a large bowl, whip together the eggs, egg yolks and the remaining ingredients except for the butter, setting the custard aside to allow the sugar to dissolve.
Generously line with the butter or ghee a large gratin or other deep baking dish large enough to accommodate all the panettone pieces and the custard. Put the panettone pieces in the dish, pressing down and packing lightly, then slowly pour in the egg and cream mixture, pressing lightly again to loosen out any large air pockets.
Refrigerate the bread pudding overnight, covered in aluminum foil. When ready to cook, remove from the refrigerator 1 hour ahead of baking time, retaining the foil cover.
Heat the oven to 350 degrees and place a large, deep roasting pan on the middle rack. Set some water to boil. Place the covered baking or gratin dish in the roasting pan and add enough boiling water to come halfway up the sides of the bread pudding pan.
Bake for 1 hour covered, then remove the foil, lower the oven temperature to 325 degrees, and bake again for an additional 1 hour, or until the pudding is nicely browned and the custard is set (your oven or elevation may require additional baking time, especially for the custard to cook through).
Serve, sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar if desired, but certainly with plenty of unsalted butter and warmed maple syrup.
"bread" - Google News
December 24, 2019 at 11:04PM
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Get Cooking: How to make panettone bread pudding - The Denver Post
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