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Valentine's Day: a gluten-free Perugina chocolate cake thinking of all lovers

The history of the Valentine's Day from a licentious pagan holiday to a religious celebration to make us forget the Lupercalia. The history of the Perugina kiss: first "fuck" then the idea of ​​remembering a woman's breast. The first advertisement: a couple of lovers on a blue background, inspired by Hayez's famous Kiss. The cake recipe

Valentine's Day: a gluten-free Perugina chocolate cake thinking of all lovers

It is the feast of lovers, a day dedicated to love, a day in which couples exchange cards, flowers, chocolates, tickets or other forms of dedication. Celebrated throughout the world on February 14th, Valentine's Day was actually born as a Christian festival in honor of the Christian martyr named Valentine of Terni, established in 496 by Pope Gelasius I, overlapping with the ancient pagan festival of Lupercalia, with the aim of Christianize the Roman holiday. In fact, through subsequent popular traditions, Valentine's Day has also become a significant cultural, religious and above all commercial celebration of romantic love in many countries around the world, although it is not considered an official holiday.

Regarding the Lupercalia, condemned by the Catholic Church, it is worth remembering that in Ancient Rome it was a custom linked to the cycle of death and rebirth of nature, to the subversion of rules and the destruction of order to allow the world and society - so he thought – to purify himself and be reborn. These celebrations were accompanied by various rituals, masquerades, processions, and days in which the servants took the place of the masters and vice versa, with the aim of triggering a process of rebirth by reenacting the primordial chaos.

In particular, some archaic fertility practices required that the women of Rome subjected themselves, in the middle of the streets, to blows inflicted by groups of young naked men, armed with bundles of branches tied together with strings. Through the whippings of these men, who "regressed" to the ancestral and divine condition of free sexuality, personified by the rural god Faunus-Wolf, women received a blessing that favored their fertility.

The history of the Valentine's Day, from a licentious pagan holiday to a religious celebration to make us forget the Lupercalia

Returning to Valentine's Day, legend has it that the saint gave a sum of money to a poor girl, needed as a dowry for her wedding, which, without it, would not have been celebrated, exposing the girl, without means and of any other support, at the risk of perdition. The generous gift - the fruit of love and aimed at love - would therefore have created the tradition of considering the holy bishop Valentine as the protector of lovers.

Hence the tradition of lovers to exchange promises, notes of eternal love, gifts, and above all many sweets, especially chocolate.

It's all too easy to predict that the commercial industry will dive head first into this party. The Greeting Card Association has estimated that every year around one billion greeting cards are sent on February 14th, a number which places this anniversary in second place in terms of number of cards purchased and sent, compared to Christmas.

Coming to our country, the iconic dessert for Italian lovers is without a doubt the Bacio Perugina. Its origins date back to 1920.

The Magnani Rocca Foundation dedicated a study to it: History of the Perugina Kiss, the most famous kiss in advertising: "There is no more dreamlike and dreamy image, more intensely ecstatic, which leads love towards the sinful, than the one created for the Baci Perugina poster. A masterpiece of sweetness and at the same time eroticism, even in the forbidden form of chocolate."

The history of the Perugina kiss: first "fuck" then the idea of ​​remembering a woman's breast

The Kiss was originally supposed to be called “Cazzotto” because it had a shape that resembled the knuckles of a hand closed in a fist. In reality it was a chocolate invented to recover the processing waste of the other products of the confectionery company, an interior of gianduia chocolate, chopped hazelnuts and a whole hazelnut, all covered in Luisa dark chocolate.

But an unsuitable name immediately appeared to invite the public to purchase with that name. Hence the intuition of Giovanni Buitoni, a young administrator of Perugina who gave it the name "Bacio" and wittily changed the shape from a punch into a small and delicate woman's breast. A further contribution came from Federico Seneca, painter, graphic designer, advertiser and artistic director of Perugina who invented the pair of lovers on a blue background, inspired by Hayez's famous Kiss.

“He repaints the background, canceling out any spatial setting. Seneca modified the clothes of the protagonists, updating them and making them more modern. In a placid evening sky, dominated by a profound silence, the silhouette images of the two lovers locked in an eternal embrace stand out.

Despite his best-known work, Seneca chooses to modify the position assumed by the female figure, inducing a sense of greater intimacy and complicity in the couple, crystallizing it in an imperishable kiss".

The first advertisement: a couple of lovers on a blue background, inspired by Hayez's famous Kiss.

And it was always Seneca some time later who accompanied the chocolates with the famous scrolls inside the silver casing (the color of moonlight). The first of a century-old tradition was wittily "better a kiss today than a hen tomorrow" signed Seneca, like the Latin philosopher, in order to generate confusion. Quotes from artists, poets, writers, essayists, philosophers, historical figures, illustrious men and women followed. A historical chapter of the famous factory which has closed in recent days with the decision to adapt the cards to current and future times, aimed above all at a young audience by introducing emoticons instead of writing.

The gluten-free chocolate cake proposed by Perugina to celebrate Valentine's Day is signed by Alberto Farinelli Master Chocolatier, a sweet proposal on the sweetest day of the year for lovers.

The recipe for gluten-free Perugina chocolate cake for Valentine's Day

Ingredients:

For the cake

100 g butter

90 g vanilla icing sugar

150 g Perugina® GranBlocco Extra Dark Chocolate 50%

6 eggs

100 g caster sugar

85 g rice flour

45 g potato starch

½ sachet baking powder for desserts

For diplomatic cream

500 g whole milk

130 g sugar

25 g corn starch (cornflour)

25 g rice starch

150 g Perugina® GranBlocco Extra Dark Chocolate 50%

30 g Perugina® Bitter cocoa powder

6 egg yolks

1 vanilla pod

300 g fresh cream for desserts

Method

Cake preparation

Melt the previously chopped Perugina GranBlocco Extra Dark Chocolate 50% in a bain-marie or in the microwave. Whip the butter softened at room temperature with the icing sugar with an electric whisk. Pour the still warm Perugina GranBlocco Extra Dark Chocolate 50% (around 35°) into the butter and sugar mixture.

Add the egg yolks after dividing them from the egg whites and continue whisking. Whip the egg whites with the granulated sugar until stiff. Add them to the mixture alternating with the flours and yeast sifted together and mix delicately.

Pour into a previously buttered 24cm diameter pan. Place in a preheated oven at 175°C for about 40 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool.

Preparation of diplomatic cream

In a large saucepan, boil the milk with the vanilla. In a bowl, pour the egg yolks with the sugar, starches and cocoa sifted together and mix very well. To thin the mixture, add a few tablespoons of hot milk. Pour everything into the pan with the boiling milk and cook over a low heat, stirring until the cream thickens.

Remove from the heat, add the previously chopped Perugina GranBlocco Dark Chocolate Extra 50%, mix everything well until the chocolate has completely melted. Pour the cream into a bowl, cover with cling film in contact with the surface and leave to cool in the refrigerator. Whip the cream for desserts, preferably kept in the fridge, until it reaches a thick consistency. Add the whipped cream to the very cold cream, mixing gently and place the mixture in the fridge until ready to fill.

Composition of the cake

Take the cooled cake and use a heart-shaped mold (maximum 10 cm in diameter) to shape two of them.

Cut the hearts in half and use a piping bag to fill them with the chocolate diplomatic cream. Close the cake and proceed to decorate the upper surface with tufts of cream and raspberries

Advice

It is preferable to use fresh cream rather than long-life cream and place it in the fridge at least half an hour before using it. When whipping it, be careful to stop when it is very firm and full-bodied, otherwise you risk separating the fat part from the liquid part making it unusable.

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