by Anna Savino –
The combination of melted sugars and crunchy rich hazelnuts explodes in your mouth. Life doesn’t get much better than this as you savour this Piemontese delicacy.
We spent the day in a tiny Alpine village called Pontechianale. There is not much to do other than admire the stone roof houses and stop in the famous bakeries for some treats. Heading straight for the wood panelled bakery, we knew just what to get. There was no doubt about the“Brut e Bon”.
I am sure you are wondering what this weird word means in Italian and why the words don’t end in vowels. Well, it’s Piemontese dialect for “Brutti e Buoni” (Ugly but Good).
I almost love their name even more than the cookie! Of course to understand it you need to familiarize yourself a bit with this dialect which seems to be omnipresent here. As I have learned, to fully understand the culture of Italy’s regions, you must also be aware of the dialects. As if learning Italian wasn’t hard enough.
“BRUT e BON” (broot-e-boon) is the perfect example of two simple words in the French sounding dialect. Not so hard to swallow when the words have to do with eating!
So let’s go back to the cookies. It is said that this Piemontese specialty happened to be created when an unproportional mix of egg whites, hazelnuts and sugar were mixed together. This case of serendipity all started in the province of Varese, Piemonte, back in 1878. The flavor was so good that even Queen Elena overlooked their ugly appearance and frequently stopped by the bakery for these irresistable guilty pleasures.
Like so many things in life (cookies included), beauty is only skin deep.
About the author:
From one wine country to another…Anna Savino, Italian American has moved from her hometown in Napa Valley California to Piemonte Italy. There she teaches English, does freelance writing and enjoys the Italian culture that she had always dreamt about. Just married, she plans on staying there and trying to connect both cultures by promoting the areas and talking about her passions, food and wine.
Visit her blog at: www.italianna.com