Panpepato
Panpepato is one of the numerous Italian fruitcakes made in winter. But unlike Panforte di Siena and Pangiallo from Rome Panpepato contains real pepper.
There are numerous recipes for Panpepato with slight variations from different corners of Italy. People from Ferrara in Emilia-Romagna have one version, which is said to date back to 1465 when the Duke of Ferrara served a panpepato with gold pieces inserted in each cake. And there are numerous other versions (without the gold) that can be traced back to specific parts of Umbria and Lazio. My recipe for Panpepato is mixture of several other recipes, and it is absolutely irresistible.
Ingredients
150 g raisins
100 ml Marsala wine
150 g almonds
150 g hazelnuts
150 g walnuts
150 g candied orange zest
150 g dark chocolate
4-5 cloves
1 tsp dark pepper
1 tsb nutmeg
1 tbs cinnamon
300 g honey
300 g flour
Preparation
Soak the raisins in Marsala
Chop walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts and mix the nuts with candied orange zest, pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg and crushed cloves.
Chop the chocolate finely or melt it in a water bath and mix it with the nuts.
Add soaked raisins to the mixture along with runny honey (Things go easier it the honey has been heated slightly and has become fluid.)
Work flour into the mixture with your hands. There’s enough flour when the dough is no longer sticky.
Shape the dough into two domes.
Bake the panpepato at 170 C / 350 F for 30 minutes. (It doesn’t have to be all dried out inside.)
Panpepato will keep from Christmas to Epiphany, which is at least 2 weeks, in a cake tin. (If you can leave it alone that long)
Well, this looks perfectly festive and definitely wouldn’t last into Epiphany in our house! :) We’ve only gone as far as making mince pies this year, here. We made chutney, too, for Christmas but we’ve nearly eaten it all! :D
Julia
We have difficulty making it last to Christmas, but I wouldn’t mind swapping the last bit for a couple of home-made mince pies. Yum.
Thank you for creating a new Christmas tradition in my house. Lovely.
It is actually. Lovely, I mean. I’m just annoyed, I can’t find time – or guests with enough appetite – to make all the nice Christmas cakes every year. Fortunately, we have a saying in Danmark that claims that Christmas lasts until Easter.
I am looking forward to trying this recipe. I have made panpepato before but not with orange. Can I assume the Marsala is a sweet version?
It should ideally be sweet Marsala, but we only even have dry Marsala in the house, so that’s what I use. I think it gives the raisins an interesting note – like dry sherry, port or brandy.
This panpepato looks scrumptious, I’m hoping to make it as gifts for Christmas, can you let me know if its plain flour or self raising flour you use .
What a lovely gift. I’m using plain flour. It is a very compact cake, which is why it will keep so long, I guess.
I have made this every year since 2015. It is so easy and one of the best fruitcakes ever! Tastes like a much more complicated recipe than it actually is. We love it!
Thank you so much. I really appreciate the feedback.
i was going to make this, but is there really 1 1/4 cup of honey, that seems a lot!
It is a lot of honey, but it is the only sweetening you add. If you don’t want to put this amount of honey in your Panpepato, you could try to substitute some of it with sugar. This version with honey is not particularly sweet.