It won out of 508 panettones arriving from all over Italy that a prestigious jury headed by Iginio Massari, the number one in Italian pastry, the master of all pastry chefs, international authority of Italian excellence and composed of Sal De Riso and Davide Comaschi, silver medal at the Coupe du Monde de Patisserie in Lyon judged this year's "Best traditional panettone".
The maker is Fausto Bertolini, patron of the Casa del Dolce of San Bonifacio in the province of Verona, born in 1951, someone who trained himself, without precedent in the family, after being struck by an occasional stop on the road to Damascus in a pastry shop in the country until he became a real authority on leavened products.
A story that is worth telling because it is typical of the Italian genius and the stubbornness of its protagonists to carry on a passion, in this case that of pastry, up to high quality levels. A sector in which Veneto has not excelled since today and where individual stories and passions have come to write pages of industrial entrepreneurship at a national level since Ruggero Bauli, who laid the foundations of his empire in Verona in 22 a Dominic Melegatti, inventor of the Pandoro, a glorious brand which, unfortunately, has known, after its glories, an industrial parable that ended unhappily.
Bertolini comes to the pastry art by chance. As a young man he was divided between the passion for football, where he had achieved good results in the Football Association, section C, coming to assert himself in the regional championships, and some work that he did around to scrape together some pennies to put in his pocket. No big deal, a few deliveries to the customers of the shopkeepers of Cologna Veneta, his hometown. But the passion for football soon collided with family needs. Fausto's parents did not sail in gold despite leading a dignified life, they lived in a council house, his father Vito was a municipal employee and his mother Maria a housewife.
The athlete leaves the ball for a safe place in the hospital
So when in 1970 the Pio Ricovero Hospital of Cologna Veneta announced a competition for the post of porter and ambulance driver, Fausto Bertolini had no hesitations, joined the tender and ranked first among all the competitors. Finally a dignified, safe and peaceful job. Finally, above all, he could relieve his burden on the family and begin to think calmly about his future and start a family.
But something was wrong. For a sportsman like him, being locked up in an office all day waiting for a call frankly disheartened him. Because ever since he was a little boy, Fausto had always been difficult to block at home: once he had done his homework, he always went around looking around, following his mental paths. Cheerful by nature, he stopped to talk to everyone, he liked company, above all he was always curious to know new things. And this tendency had remained in his soul even when he grew up. And so during the hours off work or on days off he would always come up with some chore, like going apple picking, or doing some odd work.
Even before starting work in the hospital, he had worked as a warehouseman in a mineral water and soft drink warehouse managed in Cologna Veneta by Bruno Rana, brother of the most illustrious fellow citizen of the town, Giovanni Rana, the king of tortellini, future national and international leader of fresh pasta. A mutual sympathy immediately arises with Bruno and soon Pietro becomes familiar with all the members of the family. There was a third brother, Francesco Rana who was a pastry chef, and one day talking about this and that Pietro, he expressed the desire to go and see how the laboratory worked. This not only intrigued him but he liked it beyond measure to the point that after that occasional visit Pietro's presence in the pastry shop became much more frequent, that world interested him, intrigued him and he liked it. And so the young Fausto began to enter the world of sweets.
Pastry, a sudden love that will never abandon him
In short, the young Bertolini was physically in the hospital, a place of suffering and pain, and therefore not in keeping with his cheerful and sunny character, but mentally he was always with his brain in the pastry shop, at Francesco's, trying creams, doughs, icings, sponge cake . He was fascinated to see how the basic elements, flour, sugar, eggs and yeast, were transformed into elaborations that involved all the senses with the ability that only sweets have to make us go back to greedy and insatiable children.
In the hospital Fausto also found the time to meet, fall in love with and marry Patrizia who gave him three children, two girls and a boy. In short, he had everything to feel comfortable and live a life of ordinary and peaceful administration. If it hadn't been for the pastry worm that had been working inside his brain incessantly for some time.
Until one day Fausto decided he couldn't go on like this. He had to make a choice between the bitter life of the hospital and the sweet life of the pastry shop. And guess what he made him?
He resigned from the hospital, creating panic in the family. His wife with all possible love tried to dissuade him, his relatives invited him to reconsider. Abandoning a secure job with a family behind you is at least imprudent if not reckless. His friends considered him irresponsible. It was 1980. The friend Giovanni Rana called him crazy: "But has the brain given to you to abandon a secure job to face the unknown, risking finding yourself on the street?".
Fausto with his courage as a sportsman faced that difficult moment, aware of the risk he was running but at the same time feeling that he could no longer go back. After all, he thought: "I'm 29 years old, I'm still young, if everything goes wrong, I'll be able to find some remedy".
And so it is that with no little trepidation and great caution in the popular house in Via Predicale where Fausto lives with his wife Patrizia, his three children and parents, a laboratory and sales point is opened. A modest but dignified thing where Fausto puts to good use all the teachings received from Francesco Rana and adds his passion to it. “Clients were welcomed – remembers Bertolini – in the entrance of the house, a few square meters, perhaps no more than four or five, with, at the end, a horizontal shelf that served as a counter”. His word spreads and the fears of Fausto and his family are quickly thwarted. He likes his family-artisan pastry, the flavors are genuine, the first orders of cakes arrive for weddings, communions, birthday parties.
Business immediately takes the right direction, fears seem long gone. Now we need to think bigger.
Fausto sets his eyes on a place in the very central via Rinascimento. And hey! In no time at all the Bertolini spouses leave the narrow rooms of Via Predicale and open with many anxieties – but they are used to it – an elegant pastry shop. Pietro can finally have a laboratory worthy of the name in which to give vent to his wildest imagination. Whether for the elegance of the shop, or for the new refined confectionery production, the fact is that the new place starts immediately with the wind in its sails.
Obviously one with Fausto Bertolini, used to running on football fields, is always in the running. He never feels satisfied with what he has achieved, he always looks to the next obstacle. And so to perfect his knowledge and refine his art of him, as he can, he attends refresher courses in the various disciplines. And above all he goes to do a long internship with Igino Massari and becomes his friend.
The first big challenge: the almond
The time is ripe for Fausto Bertolini to confront himself with a kind of Cologna Veneta confectionery totem, on which the raw nerves of the local people are measured, something that touches the tradition and the DNA of the people of the Venetian town, the Almond. A bit like what the Pastiera - moving in latitude - represents for the Neapolitans, a challenge to domestic certainties, to family memories, to the honor of the mother - because nobody makes it like she does - and to the honor of the party .
More than a dessert, the Mandorlato in Cologna Veneta is the brand of the town on which discussions are heated between the traditionalists, adamant in choosing the oldest and most celebrated, and the modernists who indulge in the more recent brands. It is easy to say that it is a simple, almost elementary recipe: egg whites, almonds, honey and sugar. It is like Picasso's dove, or Giotto's circle, or Fontana's cut. Art is not within the reach of all those who paint. Artists are chosen people, the artist - as they used to say - is inspired by God.
Fausto certainly does not hold back with his character. He works for months to prepare his Mandorlato which gradually takes shape and flavour, texture and meaning, not forgetting the tradition but enriching itself with a new creative imagination. Just like a hot air balloon struggles to inflate until it takes off, so your Mandorlato needs long meditations, endless sensations until it can triumphantly go into production and become a cameo in the history of this historical dessert. Aware of having accomplished something exceptional, Peter also studies how to present it worthily. For this he called two famous illustrators, Giorgio Scarato and Franco Spaliviero, the latter an illustrator who had worked for the most important Italian and international publishing houses. The people of Cologna taste it and approve it, the more difficult challenge the one with citizen feelings is won.
The second challenge: the artisan panettone
By now Bertolini has entered the Gotha of the great Italian confectionery chefs, his compositions end up in the windows of the best Parisian pastry shops, called to the States for the inauguration of San Francisco International Airport, in 2013 for the Opera Festival at the Verona Arena together with Marco Savoia, from the renowned Verona ice cream shop, he offers a Cologna almond semifreddo that causes a sensation.
Leavened products also take flight from his laboratories. He studied them for a long time, he looked around, he convinced himself of how to proceed with the manufacturing and above all with first choice raw materials. The territory is already occupied by many patisseries and bakeries that have specialized in this typical Christmas cake. Here too Fausto does not hold back from the competition and crosses the finish line: his panettone wins the award for Best Traditional Panettone in Italy for four years in a row. His products continue to win countless gold medals. With Giovanni Rana he returns to the United States for a series of gastronomic events, in which His Majesty Rana's tortellini and fresh pasta are accompanied by his mandorlato and his panettone.
Obviously his entrepreneurial rise needs a new launching pad. The beautiful pastry shop in Via Garibaldi cannot keep up with the orders arriving from Italy and abroad. And so Bertolini changed headquarters once again and landed in the new industrial area on the Cologna – San Bonifacio highway. The new spaces of the Casa del Dolce have expanded to be able to respond to the ideas of the Chef, who, with his usual passion, never rests on his laurels but needs new challenges. Because Fausto Bertolini, even if he is close to 70, maintains the heart of an athlete and the numerous challenges are the daily leaven - it is appropriate to say - for those like him, assisted by his children Francesco, Gabriella and Elisabetta and the young but already very efficient Linda, his main supporters, wants to test himself continuously, because, as John Keats, great protagonist of English romanticism said, he has always been deeply convinced that "Life is an adventure to be lived, not a problem to be solved". To live with the enthusiasm of a child.
