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Italian Cuisine Expert and Food Blogger
Guido Pedrelli
Guido Pedrelli, the mastermind behind Nonna Box, has honed his culinary expertise for decades, inspired by family feasts in Emilia-Romagna. Mentored by his restaurateur nonna, he mastered Italian classics and furthered his skills with professional culinary studies in desserts and gelato making from Mec3. Today, he shares this rich legacy and authentic recipes through Nonna Box.
Full of candied fruits and nuts, this authentic Italian recipe for Panforte di Siena that I was given when visiting the city is unbelievably delicious with notes of honey and warm spices.
It has a soft, but slightly chewy texture that will melt in your mouth with each bite.
It’s very easy to make and the perfect Tuscan dessert (check out Tuscan cuisine recipes) for any special occasion when you want to impress, but not spend hours in the kitchen.
Panforte di Siena is a traditional classic Christmas dessert from the city of Siena. It is one of the oldest and most popular confections not only in Tuscany, but throughout Italy and can easily be made at home.
The cake consists of several different types of dried and candied fruit along with a variety of nuts and spices that are then combined together with a bit of flour and honey to create a rich dough.
Once baked, the outcome is a heavenly Italian style fruit and nut cake that is sweet in taste and chewy in texture.
Toast the almonds: Preheat the oven to 320°F (160°C). When the oven is at temperature, toast the almonds in the oven on a sheet pan for about 5 minutes, or until lightly toasted (photo 1). Set aside to cool.
Prep the pan: Lightly grease a 8-in (20-cm) shallow round cake pan with butter and then line it with parchment paper. Now cut the wafer sheet to fit into a circle that fits into the bottom of the cake pan and insert over the parchment paper (photo 2). If you don’t have a wafer sheet, you can just use parchment paper.
Mix together dry ingredients: Chop the candied orange and citron into small pieces (photo 3). In a medium bowl, add the toasted almonds, the flour, the candied orange and citron pieces and all the spices and stir together (photo 4).
Make the sugar and honey syrup: In a small saucepan, add the water, honey and sugar (photo 5) and stir over low heat as they melt to form a uniform syrup (photo 6). Do not let boil, the mixture should just be heated enough to form a sort of liquid syrup.
Mix and shape the cake: Now pour the syrup into the bowl with the almonds (photo 7) and all the other ingredients and quickly stir with a wooden spoon until combined (photo 8).
Put the mixture immediately into the cake pan you have prepared (photo 9) and level with the back of a metal spoon until compact and even (photo 10).
Sprinkle the top with an abundant amount of powdered sugar using a fine mesh strainer (photo 11).
Bake the cake and let it cool: Turn the oven up to 350° F (180° C) and bake in a static oven on the middle rack for approximately 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool for 5 minutes before removing the entire cake from the cake pan and setting aside to cool on a wire rack for at least 3 hours (photo 12). When cooled completely, remove the parchment paper.
Top with powdered sugar: Sprinkle again with lots of powdered sugar, slice and serve.
Other Italian Christmas recipes to try:
The cake will stay fresh and can be stored for 3 to 4 weeks when tightly wrapped in plastic and kept in a cool place. You can also keep panforte in the fridge.
Yes, you can easily store panforte in your freezer for up to 6 months. You will need to tightly wrap it in plastic and then place it in an airtight container or freezer bag. Then when you are ready to serve, remove the cake from the freezer and allow it to completely thaw out at room temperature before eating.
Yes, you can. In fact, panforte needs a day to rest before it is served, so it is the perfect make-ahead dessert.
Panforte di Siena is traditionally served on Christmas Eve and Christmas day in Italy. But it can be served any time of year and is delicious with a nice cappuccino, coffee, or glass of port. Panforte also works well as a sweet appetizer at parties when cut into small wedges or accompanied by cheese.
In Siena and the surrounding countryside, there was a dish called “Panes Melatos.” It was a very delicious bread almost like a focaccia that was sweetened with honey and flavored with pepper. Yet, it tended to go sour and harden very quickly. As a result, the longer lasting panforte obtained its name, which means “panis fortis.”
Panforte literally means “strong bread” due to its intense spicy taste. The word is derived from the Latin panis fortis.
There have been several different variations of this Tuscan dessert over time, but the most popular is the white one, which is commonly known as traditional panforte. However, there is also a black version of panforte known as panpepato. The two versions are very similar in that their doughs are almost identical and contain nuts, candied fruit and spices. Yet, panpepato includes the addition of candied melon and is topped with pepper and spices instead of powdered sugar.
Legend has it that the panforte was born in the monastery of Monte Cellesi near Siena around the year 1000 when the kitchen assistant, Sister Leta,, found opened sacks of almonds, candied fruit, flour and spices all mixed together making it impossible to separate them.
So the Sister, wanting to preserve the precious ingredients and keep them from going to waste, began to heat some honey. She then gradually began adding in the dried fruits and nuts to the warm honey until they were completely mixed together into a sticky batter.
But during her cooking experiment, a black cat approached and brushed up against her tunic in a way that frightened her. Sister Leta saw this to be a sign from the devil. So she quickly chased it away and threw the boiling dough at the cat.
Hearing all the commotion, the Mother Abbess ran in to see what was happening and found Sister Leta celebrating her victory over the devilish cat. She was tasting what had remained of the special dough she had created and found it to be absolutely delicious with a fragrant smell and strong flavor full of spices. The Sister then named her cake Panpepato.
However, some historians have traced the panforte back to medieval origins and believe that the cake likely evolved from Panes Melatos. At that time, in Siena, it was a common dessert resembling a type of focaccia made from flour, water, figs, grapes, and honey. It was also flavored with many spices like cinnamon, pepper, and cloves, which were used to not only enrich the taste of the Panes Melatos, but also ensured the preservation of the cake.