“Panettone” is Italy’s official Christmas cake, and is famous for being difficult to prepare to perfection. Therefore, when Pasticceria Giotto’s version was elected one of the ten best in the country, it was a real honor. But the most striking difference between Panettone Giotto and the other nine on the list is that Giotto is made in a prison.
Inside the Due Palazzi prison on the outskirts of Padua in northeast Italy, a team of inmates wearing white aprons is supervised by four professional pastry chefs.
Six days a week, they start work at 4 am, starting from the brioche that will be served by the city’s pastries and hotels. Giotto also produces cookies, pies, nougat, chocolate and ice cream, but Panettone is the specialty.
Giovanni​, an inmate who identified himself only by his first name, following prison guidelines, has worked at the candy store for the last five years of his 23rd sentence. Authorities do not reveal the detainee’s crimes.
“Before I was arrested, I had never tasted a panettone,” he said, “but I really like it, and every Christmas I buy five or six and send it to my family in Sicily.”
The Italian word “panettone” is derived from “panetto”, a small cake. The suffix “one” changes the meaning to “big cake”. Similar recipes date back to the Roman Empire, when honey was used to sweeten a kind of fermented dough.
The cake is mentioned in a cookbook written in the 1500s by Bartolomeo Scappi, head chef of popes and kings during the time of Holy Empire Emperor Charles 5th; it was first cited as “pan de ton” (“luxury bread”) by 18th-century scholar Pietro Verri in one of his texts.
A well-made Panettone is a matter of pride for Italian “pasticcerie” (sweet shops), and every year Italians consume about 9.5 million of these cakes, mostly around Christmas and New Year.
Its preparation is a meticulous process that involves several beatings and fermentations over 72 hours. After baking for an hour, the cakes are removed from the oven and left to cool upside down so that their typical rounded tops do not wither. In all, Giotto’s team will bake more than 80 thousand Panettone this holiday season.
The bakery program, which began in 2005, is led by Work Crossing Cooperative, a non-profit group that operates prison work programs in the region. In early December, the cooperation even opened a Pasticceria Giotto store in Padua.
Italy’s prison system is overcrowded, and the national recidivism averages 70%, according to the Ministry of Justice, with the majority of inmates returning for longer sentences than the first. This rate drops to 5%, however, for detainees who work while incarcerated.
Matteo Marchetto, president of Work Crossing Cooperative, said the Italian constitution clearly mentions education as part of the goal of a prison sentence.
“The sentence must be carried out in full, but at the same time there must be a path to recovery,” Marchetto said. “Otherwise these years will be a waste of public resources.”
Before being accepted into the bakery program, detainees must be seen by a psychologist for six months. Once approved, they do a six-month internship before being employed.
Over the next six months, they earn 650 euros, about R$4,200, a month. Then they are promoted to 800 euros, BRL 5,200, and finally to 1,000 euros, about BRL 6,500. During the process, the inmates continue to work with psychologists.
Matteo Concolato, a pastry chef who helps supervise inmates as they work, said he has personally witnessed the benefits of the program.
“One thing that gives a lot of satisfaction is to see a man who maybe has never worked before, with years in prison, and gradually falls in love, acquires a sense of responsibility for what he’s doing, begins to trust himself and others again” , he said.
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