Italianismi
Italianismi nel mondo is a project of Casa Artusi in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation on the occasion of the 8th Week of Italian Cuisine in the World. A fascinating journey into the language of food, which finds in Italian words spread all over the world, such as pasta, pizza, coffee, and many other dialects, the true symbol of the extraordinary national gastronomic culture.
Videos in 8 world languages available on this page!
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Italian sounds abroad: panettone
Panettone is both one of the most characteristic and characterising desserts of Italian cuisine, and one of the most famous and most frequently exported. The origin of the word can be found in the Milanese panattón, augmentative of pan (bread) or...
Pasta, the queen of the table
The fact that pasta, especially as of the Middle Ages, has played a fundamental role in the diet of Italians is shown by the antiquity of the many words used to describe it, first and foremost maccheroni and ravioli. Cited in Boccaccio's...
Words with the fragrance of coffee
The noun caffè indicates both the tropical shrubby plant of the Coffea genus and the famous drink made with the beans of the latter, which are roasted and ground. Coffee comes from the Turkish qahve, which in turn comes from the Arabic qahwa. The...
Gastronomic dialectisms, the artichoke from Italy to the world
By artichoke, we commonly indicate the plant species Cynara cardunculus, a perennial plant of the Asteraceae. The Italian term is an Arabism which comes from ḫaršūf ( Enciclopedia Treccani, s.v. carciofo; DELIn, s.v. carciofo). There is no...
Pizza, an Italian fairytale
Today, pizza, is the best-known Italian word in the world and most representative dish of Italian cuisine. Its story is truly unusual and, in some ways, mysterious. Today's meaning of pizza, i.e. that of a 'round focaccia of leavened dough,...
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