Panforte is a festive Italian cake that lives up to its name. Pan (bread) and forte (strong) are apt descriptors for this dense fruit- and nut-jammed cake. Its history stretches back to Siena, Tuscany, during the Middle Ages, when a bread flavored with honey and pepper was paid to the local monks as a tax. When the spice trade introduced a trove of spices to Italy through Venice, more spices were added to the bread, and it became a Christmas tradition.
Panforte is a stiff and sticky package: a jumble of nuts, dried fruit, and spice bound together by a slick of honey syrup and chocolate that hardens the cake as it cools, inching it into confection territory. As un-cakey as this might sound, panforte is delicious.
