Credit: Mara Zemgaliete/ Adobe Stock
While Italian bread varieties such as focaccia and pane toscano have existed for centuries, ciabatta came into existence around the same time as MTV and Macintosh computers. It was invented in 1982 by baker and miller Arnaldo Cavallari, who lamented the growing popularity of French baguettes in Italy. Fearing those imported loaves could negatively affect his business, Cavallari got to work creating a similar, commercially viable yet authentically Italian alternative to baguettes.
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It's a factOn September 2, 1666, the Great Fire of London began at a bakery owned by the king’s baker, Thomas Farriner, on Pudding Lane. The inferno spread rapidly and burned for four days before it was finally extinguished. During that time, the fire destroyed an estimated 86% of the city.
Cavallari enlisted the help of two expert flour bakers, seeking to create a softer, wetter dough that would emulate the crispy crust of a baguette while concealing fluffier bread on the inside. After weeks of testing, the team achieved their goal, dubbing the new bread ciabatta polesana. In a 1999 interview with The Guardian, Cavallari said he picked the name ciabatta — which means “slipper” in Italian — because of the loaf’s shape, while polesana refers to the Polesine region where he lived.
Knowing he had a hit on his hands, Cavallari copyrighted the name and sold his recipe to various local restaurants. Ciabatta soon went global, making its way to the U.S. in 1987.
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______ consumes more bread per capita than any other country.
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Turkey consumes more bread per capita than any other country.
A NASA astronaut smuggled a corned beef sandwich into space.
In 1965, astronauts John Young and Gus Grissom embarked on the first two-man spaceflight in the history of the U.S. space program. Young also managed to smuggle a stowaway on board: a corned beef sandwich. In a postflight interview with Life magazine, Young admitted, “I hid [the sandwich] in a pocket of my spacesuit.”
Grissom took a bite mid-flight, causing crumbs to scatter about the cabin. According to the flight log, Young then remarked that sneaking the sandwich on board “was a thought, anyways … Not a very good one.”
Despite Young’s innocent intentions, the stunt was decried as “foolish” by Illinois Representative George E. Shipley, who worried the crumbs could have caused a malfunction. In an effort to quell his concerns, NASA administrator George Mueller promised that steps had been taken “to prevent recurrence of corned beef sandwiches on future flights.”
Bennett Kleinman is a New York City-based staff writer for Optimism Media, and previously contributed to television programs such as "Late Show With David Letterman" and "Impractical Jokers." Bennett is also a devoted New York Yankees and New Jersey Devils fan, and thinks plain seltzer is the best drink ever invented.
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