Ingredients
For recipe see Italy Revisited/Recipes/"Fiadone"
Directions
Notes
Many first generation Italians from the Molise countryside don't actually call this recipe "fiadone" (even though that's how Molise's government tourist booklets call them). In Montagano, Campobasso, Susan Marbello, noted that her grandmother calls them "sha-done" and in other areas in Abruzzo they may be called "theadone." My mother calls them (to my ears) "hiadone" and/or "shiaton." Who knows how many more variations there are? In any case, the reason these Easter sweets may have been called "fiadone" is because the word "hiadone," in the Molise dialect means out of breath or all puffed up. As these pastry pockets look "puffed up" that's why they are called what they are (Well, this is the explanation given by my brother-in-law, a first generation Italian who grew up in Santa Croce di Magliamo). Photo: Mary Melfi |
