by Enzo Coccia
Six years ago, I met Eduardo Ore, a talented Neapolitan pizzaiolo who moved to Piacenza. We met in my pizzeria during one of the many events organized to present the Sun on a plate, a short movie about the Neapolitan pizza produced by Rio Film and made by film director Alfonso Postiglione. One of those meetings for insiders during which you have the chance to meet young colleagues and exchange opinions on our profession. When you spend so many years of your life in contact with the customers, colleagues and producers – as I’ve been doing for ages! – you gain a wealth of experience so as to be able to evaluate, in most cases in an almost infallible way, if the person who stands before you is really interested in what you do, your projects and your dreams or if he or she is listening to you just to be courteous and well-mannered.
When I met Eduardo, I immediately realized that he is a true artisan, with a lot of integrity and dedication to the complex but wonderful world of food and cooking. Over the years, our paths have crossed many times, we worked in harmony on a number of projects and our working relationship has gradually strengthened to such a point that I chose him for my latest project: in my new place ‘O sfizio d’’a Notizia Eduardo is the production manager. To end 2016 with a bang, such an intense a year which is giving us a lot of satisfaction, Eduardo proposed that we make panettoni.
“Enzo what about making some panettoni for our customers to celebrate Christmas?”. Eduardo is a rigorous worker but, at the same time, he has a great curiosity, an essential quality to further oneself, which marks him every day and continually pushes him to new challenges.
That’s why I welcomed his proposal with approval and seriousness. I already know that someone, reading this post, will immediately think: “But what does a Neapolitan pizzaiolo have to do with the Panettone Milanese?”. I can assure that it is neither a marketing gimmick nor a trick to get an economic return. Let’s say that Eduardo and I dealt with the “research”, studying how a typical product from Milan, as the panettone is, can dialog with our “Campania Felix”, have a local feedback, or in other words “speak Neapolitan”.
And so, it appeared “Vesuvius”, a panettone that speaks Neapolitan because it is made with the mother yeast from catalanesca grape and, at a later time, we obtained, from the same Campania’s wine variety, withered grapes for its filling.
In short, to the techniques of the great Milanese pastry chefs, Achille Zoia and Piergiorgio Giorilli, of which Eduardo was a student, which gave birth to the authentic artisanal panettone, we added the flavors of our land, aware that the fusion of these delicacies can create a quality product. Now, I can only invite you to try a slice of it, exclusively at La Notizia.
