This small shop has looked onto the main piazza in Borgofranco d’Ivrea for almost 40 years. It produces and sells canestrelli, the delicious biscuit typical of the Canavese area that gives it its name, and many other types of biscuit too. The canestrelli, made from a simple mixture of eggs, butter, flour, sugar and Persico, a traditional liqueur, come in different flavours, from cacao to hazelnut, from vanilla to coffee, from chestnut to raspberry. The mixture is rolled out and cooked on a red-hot griddle to give the biscuit its characteristic thin, rounded shape. The new extra plain chocolate flavour is especially yummy.
The shop also produces savoury versions in flavours such as parmesan and black pepper, chili, olive, onion, anchovy, rosemary and speck, pesto and tomato, garlic and oregano, all excellent with cocktails.
Other biscuits include baci di dama (“lady’s kisses”, semi-spherical chocolate-coated shortcrust pastry cookies with chopped almonds or hazelnuts), paste di meliga (cornmeal cookies), krumiri (typical ridged cookies) and the delicious noccioloni (hazelnut chocolates). Butter- and wheat and hazelnut flour-free variants are also available for those who suffer from food intolerances and vegans.
***
