Panna cotta = Piedmont

P = Piedmont panna cotta

a traditional registered recipe since 2001

Let's be real... who doesn't like panna cotta?? Simple and versatile, it's a world wide people pleaser from Piedmont!

Panna cotta literally means cooked cream, and we mean heavy whipping cream. This is because according to the registered traditional recipe here in Piedmont, NW Italy, you make it by cooking heavy whipping cream with sugar, vanilla or a citrus peel, and by adding gelatin. This is the very basic recipe you can serve with fresh fruit, coulis, natural syrups, chocolate and / or coffee sauce. 

Keep reading for our recipe.

Different versions of panna cotta have been around in Europe since at the very least 1244 when Henrik Harpestræg, a Danish doctor who had studied in Sicily, included in one of his books moos hwit - a dessert almost identical to panna cotta.

Even though, up to the 1960s there is no mention of panna cotta in the Italian cookbooks, legend has it that we owe it to a Hungarian lady who in the early 1900s had moved to the Langhe wine district (Unesco World Heritage Site) here in Piedmont.

G is for Genepy

Elda's Genepy

Our friend Elda has recently gifted us with a bottle of her own artisan Genepy. As this is a traditional Northwestern Alpine liquor, this is what we are sharing with you today.

Piedmont's very diverse landscape can be  divided in layers: a crown of mountains - the Alps, a ring of hills - where our wines and truffles are from, the plain with the longest Italian river, the Po and the lakes flow. This rich diversity in our landscapes generates an amazing variety of climates and biodiversity,  and consequently, of both natural and artisan products.

Seasonality is another key word whenever we are talking of our local products, because wines, cheeses and local dishes are forced to follow the four distinct season Piedmont enjoys every year.

This is why we love to say that in our region, fashion and food together follow the seasons 😁 

So, it doesn't come as a surprise that the very first Italian National Park - Parco Nazionale del Gran Paradiso (established back in 1922) is also located here in Piedmont where we have always felt a deep connection to nature and its rhythms. 

Genepy is a traditional product of the Western side of Piedmont and can also be produced in our neighboring Valle D'Aosta region.

It is made only from specific  and locally grown varieties of the Artemisia genus, a medicinal herb  or shrub of the family of mugwort, sagebrush and wormwood. One of these local varieties is called Genepi because it is used to make this liquor.

These are short, hard herbaceous plants that grow up among the rocks near where glaciers start, at 2000/2700 m or 6561/8858 ft. These short shrubs are 5 to 20 cm or 2 to 8 in tall and follow a quick vital cycle, so they must be picked fairly quickly, at the end of the Alpine summer.

Marco Giachello, a real chef from Piedmont

The chef is an artist who shapes nature's ingredients into dishes that are deeply rooted in their territory. Preserving the original flavors and atmospheres has always been an important concept in Italian cuisine and even more in Piedmont where Slow Food was born.

The bond between the chef and his/her home region is vital because it emphasizes how local specialties vary town to town around the year and how they can be developed to adapt to a more modern taste.

Chef Marco Giachello shaving white truffles over his egg tajarin