  on Amazon We've all heard the story of the 4th Earl of Sandwich, who supposedly "invented" the sandwich. In fact, it was his servant who concocted a lunch with a slab of meat placed between two slices of bread. All the Earl had to do was eat it, and the name stuck. The history of the sandwich goes back thousands of years before the Earl took his first bite. A recipe in the ancient Roman cookbook, Apicius, De re coquinaria (Apicius, on the Art of Cooking) details a dish called Isicia Omentata, made of minced meat, pepper, wine, pine nuts and garum, which could be seen as an early version of a sloppy Joe. The Apicius is thought to have been compiled sometime before 400 AD. Historians have found evidence of a something called "panis quadratus," translating as "squared bread". Like the modern panino, this flatbread creation was filled with whatever was on hand: cheese, greens, herbs, olives, fish, etc. I've also read about flatbreads being used as a vessel for fisherman to contain their meal, either cut open and filled or folded to hold the contents. Ancient Romans had the equivalent of fast food sandwich shops called thermopolia, where citizens could get lunch fare. Pane means bread in Italian. The word panino means little bread. Panino imbottito literally translates as a stuffed panino, but throughout Italy, panino is generally used to describe most types of sandwiches.
There are 20 regions in Italy and all of them have at least several types of panini. From Rome, Lampredotto (stomach lining), Porchetta from Lazio region, Puccia Pugliese in Pugliia, Panino Mortadella from Bologna, Naple's Panuozzo di Gragnano, to Panelle (fried chickpea) in Sicily. In Italy, the options for panini are endless... and delicious. A closing word... A pet peeve of mine that lots of Americans get wrong: Panino is used to describe ONE sandwich. Panini is plural, used only for more than one sandwich. --Jerry Finzi  GVI recommended on AMAZON |
On Amazon:
|
RSS Feed
