Did you know that 350 varieties of bread originate from Italy? The country’s cuisine is intimately connected with this staple food.
From thick loaves to delectable breadsticks, you should try out these 10 best Italian bread brands at least once.
A few brands on our list are mass manufacturers, so you can find their products in specialized shops wherever you are. Meanwhile, others are artisan bakeries that you can only find locally. Check them out if you’re ever in the area!
Top 10 Best Italian Bread Brands You Should Taste At Least Once
1. Morato Pane (1970)
Morato Pane has been making bread for over 50 years. The company was founded in 1970 by Luigi Morato as a small bakery in Vicenza, northeastern Italy. Luigi began to experiment with different baking methods to produce loaves that are convenient as well as tasty.
In 1989, Morato Pane began to produce pre-packaged bread under a variety of names such as Bruschelle, Sputinelle, and Tenerelle. They were huge successes and that gave Morato Pane the momentum that it needed to expand throughout Italy.
Today, Morato Pane’s pre-packaged bread is enjoyed not just domestically, but also in many countries all around the world. Their products are often the most popular on sales charts for processed bread in the US.
That probably has given you an idea of just how good Morato’s bread is. Being mass-manufactured doesn’t seem to interfere with the tastiness of the packaged loaves at all.
2. Panificio Marinato (1985)
Panificio Marinato was founded by Ezio Marinato – a world champion in the art of bread-making. In 2002, Marinato won the European Baking Championship hosted in Bulle, Switzerland. Again in 2007, he won the Bakery World Cup in Lyon, France.
If you ever find yourself in Cinto Caomaggiore, a small commune in Venice, definitely breeze by his bakery. It serves fresh bread loaves and other baked goods every day. Since it’s made by a master chef, every loaf is going to be opulently decorated. It would almost be like tasting a work of art.
One of the bakery’s signature works is the panpolenta. It’s basically a type of breadstick made from white corn polenta, or Italian boiled cornmeal. This kind of soft cornbread makes for a perfect companion with Italian cheeses or bread dippings.
3. Mulino Bianco (1974)
Known for its lines of packaged sweets and pastries, Mulino Bianco can be found in the pantry of just about every Italian family.
The company was founded in 1974 in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy. Through the years, it has captured the Italian food market with its cookies, crackers, and candy bars.
But these days, you won’t just find their products in Italy alone. Walk around European supermarkets and it’s almost guaranteed that you’d have a run-in with one of the company’s products.
Other than sweets and pastries, Mulino Bianco also offers pre-packaged bread, as well. From whole loaves to sliced bread, it is a great brand to consider if you need a quick and convenient addition to your meal plan.
The quality of Mulino Bianco’s packaged bread is decent. It is not on par with artisan-made bread, of course. But the tastiness of “made in Italy” bread will still be there.
4. Profumo di Lievito
Profumo di Lievito was created by Simone Rodolfi. Similar to Ezio Marinato of Panificio Marinato, he was an award-winning baker who had claimed many prestigious titles.
Notably, he was the winner of Sirha Lyon 2007 and the Siab Bakery Award 2010 hosted in Verona. During both competitions, he won just by using his own sourdough bread recipes.
Though young, Rodolfi can serve up some truly spectacular baked goods. At Profumo di Lievito in the city of Brescia, you can find his special pandoro – a type of Italian sweet bread. It is often served dusted with vanilla sugar on top, made to resemble the snowy peaks of the Alps around Christmas times.
Sure enough, this is a festival treat for the locals. Still, it doesn’t hurt to give pandoro a try if you ever get the opportunity to visit the bakery.
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5. Laboratorio in Corso
The person behind Laboratorio in Corso (“The Workshop in Corso”) is chef Antonio Lamberto Martino. To speak a little about his resume, he was one of the judges on Bake Off Italia. It is the Italian version of the BBC’s hit cooking show Bake Off.
Every product that came out of the Laboratorio’s ovens and put on display is made by hand. Martino is extremely traditional in this regard: manual bread-making skills are valued.
Ever since he discovered he has Crohn’s Disease when he was 28, Martino has been experimenting with easy-to-digest doughs. It’s a long-running experiment that continues to this day: all of the loaves there are made from healthy, low-gluten flours.
6. Panificio Vulaiga
Spear-headed by Eugenio Pol, Panificio Vulaiga has the reputation of being one of the best (if not the best) artisan bakeries in Italy. The bakery pumps out over 500 kilos of fresh bread every week, with fresh loaves on sale every day.
What’s special about Panificio Vulaiga is that the loaves put on sale don’t use leavening agents. Instead, Pol makes use of a special type of sourdough that contains over 50% monococcus. It gives the bread a truly special taste and quality that one can hardly find elsewhere.
You can find Panificio Vulaiga in the small commune of Fobello in Vercelli province, which itself is located in the Piedmont region of Italy.
7. Panificio Davide Longoni
Holding a degree in literature and a Master in communication, Davide Longoni doesn’t seem like the type of person who would enjoy (and be very good at) baking. Nonetheless, he’s one of the best bread-makers in Italy these days.
Inspired by Eugenio Pol (whose bakery we just featured above), Longoni spent a lot of his time researching the ancient techniques of bread-making. Then, in this workshop situated in Milano, he produces a variety of bread made from traditional cereals like rye and durum wheat using these same techniques.
As a result, every loaf, no matter the kind, is characteristically Italian down to the last bread crumbs.
8. Forno Brisa (2015)
Forno Brisa’s story began in 2015 as a business concept created by Pasquale Polito and Davide Sarti. Having a chain of stores in Bologna, Forno Brisa is super popular among the locals. It is the place to stop by whenever people need to restock their pantry with fresh bread.
They are known for their lines of artisan-made bread loaves, made from very special ingredients that they referred to as “evolutionary mixtures” (miscugli evolutivi).
Basically, Forno Brisa selects varieties of wheat that had long since been abandoned. Supposedly, they provide a lot more nutritional values than the modern strains that are around today.
Forno Brisa bakes everything from small, sandwich-size loaves of white bread all the way to 2-kilo giant bread loaves. You can also freely select special kinds of Emilian breads or loaves made from ancient Sicilian grains.
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9. Forno Santa Rita (1999)
In 1999, Maurizio Spinello decided to open a bakery in a micro-town with only 11 inhabitants. He was deemed crazy then. The town, Santa Rita, was gradually becoming a ghost town as people left it one after another in search of opportunities elsewhere.
Nowadays, that same “crazy” bakery is known as one of the best in Sicily. Baked goods from Forno Santa Rita are in demand everywhere across the country and even abroad.
Spinello uses ancient Sicilian grains rather than modern genetically-modified grains. It makes each loaf special in every facet compared to supermarket frozen bread.
All loaves are yeast-free, so they can last a very long time (up to 2 weeks). The ingredients are just water, salt, and a sourdough-based raising agent. It’s then cooked inside of a traditional terracotta oven using olive and almond wood.
The bread at Forno Santa Rita is 100% organic. It was certified by the Italian Association of Organic Farming.
10. Lièvita
Alessandro Battazza is the man behind Lièvita, a bakery in the seaside commune of Riccione. It is a town that’s famous for its beach parties. If you were to visit Lièvita, you’d see that it has the same vibe as the town.
Battazza bakes his bread on outdoor grills and Serbian earthenware pots. It’s a strange convention. Nevertheless, the unorthodox techniques do create some of the best bread in Italy.
The specialty of the place is “broken wheat bread” (Pane con grano spezzato). It is a kind of sourdough bread that is made from coarsely crushed wheat. The bread’s only dusted with a bit of sesame seeds. Thus, it’s a great food for people who don’t like to have a lot of multigrain seeds in their bread.
Prepared by hand, this special kind of bread can easily weigh over 1 kilo!
Final Words
There’s a “culture of bread” in Italy that you must definitely experience at least once if you were to ever visit the country.
Nonetheless, you don’t need to purchase an expensive plane ticket to have a taste of fresh baked goods from the best Italian bread brands. Many of them are present overseas (Morato Pane or Mulino Bianco, for example). Search online or in your local grocery stores to see if you can find any. It’ll be well worth the time and effort!