From panettone to pasta, China's love affair with Italian food

CHONGQING — Panettone, a traditional festive pastry from Italy, has gained increasing popularity among young people in China over the recent Christmas and New Year holidays.

Liu Haozhe, who runs an Italian pizzeria in Southwest China's Chongqing, introduced panettone to his customers during Christmas. In five days, he baked nearly 30 loaves, which were snapped up by curious diners.

"This bread contains sugared orange peel, raisins and rum, which provide sweetness and flavor," says Liu.

"The addition of butter adds a dense taste to the bread body. The towering and fluffy shape is very festive and can be shared with friends."

In Chongqing, renowned in China for its crimson chili peppers and spicy cuisine, another red color has appeared on its food map — tomatoes, a common ingredient in Italian food.

On a local street famous for its exquisite bistros, a restaurant called Richang specializes in handmade pasta. In 2023, it was listed as a recommended restaurant by an online guide to local food. Their signature dish is spaghetti bolognese, and it also serves tagliatelle, a form of pasta from the Emilia-Romagna region, with beef and pork belly. The white wine in the sauce stimulates the aromas of tomato, carrot, onion and meat.

With such additions, the city is equipped to serve up authentic Italian flavors, with all kinds of pasta tempting the taste buds of young local people.

Richang is owned by Sun Wei, who studied overseas and loves to eat fresh homemade pasta. She opened the restaurant because she wanted people in her hometown to experience authentic Italian-style cuisine.

"The taste of Italian food is more based on tomatoes, which is in line with the tastes of Chinese people," she says.

"With the growing awareness of catering, Chinese people are increasingly fond of a diverse array of food. Italian ingredients are very rich in taste and varied, so it meets the needs of different customers."

The Italian Food Week held in late 2023 saw a series of food activities in cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing and Hong Kong, including more than 30 activities in southwestern China. These included tasting events, cooking classes and various types of promotional activities. At Richang, diners took part in spaghetti-making classes and learned how wheat flour is turned into spaghetti.

At Bella Napoli, a restaurant in Shanghai, diners not only eat authentic oven-baked pizza but also enjoy Italian-style performances all year round, complete with Mediterranean-style decorations.

At bakeries across China, Italian-style bread is favored by customers. Wang Yuxuan from Beijing is a lover of Italian bread. She believes that breads such as focaccia and ciabatta are not only chewy but also low in oil and sugar, making them a good carbohydrate choice for people who want to keep fit.

As a representative of the Mediterranean diet, Italian cuisine is not just a list of foods, but more of a lifestyle that helps people maintain their health while building and strengthening social interactions.

Olive oil provides healthy fats; tomatoes inhibit the oxidation of cholesterol and reduce the risk of heart disease; and the use of spices reduces the amount of oil and salt used, making dishes light and healthy. This kind of food has become increasingly popular on the Chinese dinner table, as people pursue a range of health options.

As traditional Italian cuisine grows in popularity among Chinese people, such dishes are also combined with local ingredients, creating a fusion of the two countries' food cultures.

In southwestern China, local ingredients fuse with Italian-style food, resulting in culinary innovations. Some restaurants use tofu as a white sauce, combined with beef, Sichuan peppercorns and other ingredients, to create a mapo-tofu style lasagna.

In another local innovation, fluffy focaccia bread is stuffed with a filling of salted vegetables, and the whole thing is topped with shaobai (a kind of preserved pork with mustard greens).

Likewise, in addition to traditional options like basil, locally smoked sausage can be used as an innovative pizza topping.

Italian ambassador to China Massimo Ambrosetti describes China and Italy as "two countries with these really amazing traditions in terms of national cuisines. From north to south in Italy, as in China, we have so many different dishes and so many gastronomical traditions, that these are really unique".

Innovation also gets the ambassador's seal of approval.

"I think for contemporary cuisine, a fusion is inevitable ... something which underlines the success of cuisine. I think fusion is good."