Turin titillates taste buds with chocolate fair
(ANSA) - Turin, March 25 - Turin is celebrating its reputation as Italy's Chocolate Capital with the Cioccolato' chocolate show, running March 25 to April 3.
Festivities will feature 6,000 chocolate makers from Piedmont's historic chocolate district, other parts of Italy and the world, with tastings, exhibits, cooking courses, tours and river cruises, starting from Piazza Vittorio Veneto in the center of town.
Venues will be open from 10:00 to 20:00 Sunday through Friday, and until 23:00 on Saturday. Slow Food and Cioccolato' are cooking up a chocolate-based menu at Ristorante La Piazza Friday, March 25 to kick off the week devoted to chocolate.
Guest of honor will be Enric Rovira, the Catalan chocolate design artist.
Reservations can be made at the Fondazione Piazza dei Mestieri. The ChocoFarm in the middle of Piazza Vittorio Veneto will treat visitors to the tasty stages of chocolate making, from the base to its final form.
The fully functioning gianduia factory, created by Piedmontese chocolate maker Silvio Bessone, will be in operation from 10:00 to 19:00.
Gianduia is a hazelnut-and-chocolate confection for which Turin is famed and Bessone is an acknowledged master gianduia maker. Spalm Beach, also in Piazza Vittorio Veneto, will recreate an Italian beach club, complete with sun umbrellas, lounge chairs, cabins and a lifeguard tower, where visitors can enjoy chocolate spread or "spalmato" on bread. Professional chocolate taster Monica Meschini will take visitors on chocolate tasting tours.
Meschini will take groups to see chocolate artisans, and to taste their sweets artfully matched with other Piedmont specialties, like the digestif barolo chinato, artisan-made gelato and hazelnuts. The Golden Gianduia Award will be given to the best gianduia maker in Italy, on Saturday, April 2 which is Gianduia Day.
Visitors to the Piazza Palazzo di Citta' can taste Piedmont's premium, locally produced gianduia for a minimum contribution of two euro.
Proceeds will benefit poor children in cocoa producing countries. The Museo Accorsi Ometto will show visitors how aristocrats of the 1700's indulged in hot chocolate, when it was still a privilege of elite circles.
The concoction will be served up to visitors at the end of the culinary tour of a period kitchen, dining room and specialized utensils. Turin's chocolate-making roots began in 1559, when Emanuele Filiberto di Savoia, the general leading Emperor Charles V's Spanish military forces, brought cocoa beans home to Piedmont.
He served them up the following year in a steamy drink during festivities to celebrate the change of the Savoia capital from Chambery to Turin. Chocolate was served in the region exclusively as a hot beverage until 1826, the year entrepreneur Pierre Paul Caffarel introduced the production of solid chocolate.
Caffarel is still a leading Italian chocolate brand. Cocoa scarcity spawned the invention of Turin's famous gianduia in 1852.
A Napoleonic naval blockade prevented cocoa from reaching Italian ports.
Chocolatier Michele Prochet found he could combine prohibitively expensive cocoa with locally grown, toasted hazelnuts, to produce the delicious new confection.
Gianduia was commercialized in 1865, becoming the first chocolates wrapped in glittering foil.
In 1878, Prochet merged his activity with the company founded by Caffarel. As the popularity of gianduia grew, so did Piedmont's gianduia making district - as well as imitators throughout Italy.
Today the Piedmont region produces 80,000 tons of gianduia, just 40% of Italy's total production. Gianduia was also central to the fortunes of Italy's chocolate multinational Ferrero.
Pietro Ferrero started the industrialized chocolate maker in the Piedmont town of Alba in 1942.
His first product was a hazelnut and chocolate spread called "giandujot," a precursor to the company's world-famous Nutella.
Festivities will feature 6,000 chocolate makers from Piedmont's historic chocolate district, other parts of Italy and the world, with tastings, exhibits, cooking courses, tours and river cruises, starting from Piazza Vittorio Veneto in the center of town.
Guest of honor will be Enric Rovira, the Catalan chocolate design artist.
Reservations can be made at the Fondazione Piazza dei Mestieri. The ChocoFarm in the middle of Piazza Vittorio Veneto will treat visitors to the tasty stages of chocolate making, from the base to its final form.
The fully functioning gianduia factory, created by Piedmontese chocolate maker Silvio Bessone, will be in operation from 10:00 to 19:00.
Gianduia is a hazelnut-and-chocolate confection for which Turin is famed and Bessone is an acknowledged master gianduia maker. Spalm Beach, also in Piazza Vittorio Veneto, will recreate an Italian beach club, complete with sun umbrellas, lounge chairs, cabins and a lifeguard tower, where visitors can enjoy chocolate spread or "spalmato" on bread. Professional chocolate taster Monica Meschini will take visitors on chocolate tasting tours.
Meschini will take groups to see chocolate artisans, and to taste their sweets artfully matched with other Piedmont specialties, like the digestif barolo chinato, artisan-made gelato and hazelnuts. The Golden Gianduia Award will be given to the best gianduia maker in Italy, on Saturday, April 2 which is Gianduia Day.
Visitors to the Piazza Palazzo di Citta' can taste Piedmont's premium, locally produced gianduia for a minimum contribution of two euro.
Proceeds will benefit poor children in cocoa producing countries. The Museo Accorsi Ometto will show visitors how aristocrats of the 1700's indulged in hot chocolate, when it was still a privilege of elite circles.
The concoction will be served up to visitors at the end of the culinary tour of a period kitchen, dining room and specialized utensils. Turin's chocolate-making roots began in 1559, when Emanuele Filiberto di Savoia, the general leading Emperor Charles V's Spanish military forces, brought cocoa beans home to Piedmont.
He served them up the following year in a steamy drink during festivities to celebrate the change of the Savoia capital from Chambery to Turin. Chocolate was served in the region exclusively as a hot beverage until 1826, the year entrepreneur Pierre Paul Caffarel introduced the production of solid chocolate.
Caffarel is still a leading Italian chocolate brand. Cocoa scarcity spawned the invention of Turin's famous gianduia in 1852.
A Napoleonic naval blockade prevented cocoa from reaching Italian ports.
Chocolatier Michele Prochet found he could combine prohibitively expensive cocoa with locally grown, toasted hazelnuts, to produce the delicious new confection.
Gianduia was commercialized in 1865, becoming the first chocolates wrapped in glittering foil.
In 1878, Prochet merged his activity with the company founded by Caffarel. As the popularity of gianduia grew, so did Piedmont's gianduia making district - as well as imitators throughout Italy.
Today the Piedmont region produces 80,000 tons of gianduia, just 40% of Italy's total production. Gianduia was also central to the fortunes of Italy's chocolate multinational Ferrero.
Pietro Ferrero started the industrialized chocolate maker in the Piedmont town of Alba in 1942.
His first product was a hazelnut and chocolate spread called "giandujot," a precursor to the company's world-famous Nutella.