Bonci's World
Since 1953, in Montevarchi in Tuscany, the Bonci family has been doing one thing only: sweets that are hard to leave half-finished. It all began with grandparents Giuseppe and Irma, then came their first-born Silvio and a few years later his brothers and sister Sergio, Anna and Alessandro. Today there is a third generation, Giulia, Gianmarco and Gianluca, who together with Silvio, Sergio, Alessandro and Michele Mezzasoma keep alive a pastry and chocolate craft handed down from one pair of hands to the next for over seventy years. The method has never changed: mixing ingredients you wouldn’t expect, trying out new flavours, chasing that one taste that makes you say “now that’s good”. That is how Panbriacone was born, the cake that made our name. And that is still how all our treats come to life today: made by hand, naturally leavened, with natural ingredients and no preservatives.
We only make what we believe in... and we mean it
Our family is the first to love Bonci sweets. Every day we only send into production what we would want to see on our own table first, made the way we have liked it for three generations: strictly by hand, with natural, top-quality ingredients, no colourings and no preservatives.
Today Alessandro, Gianluca, Gianmarco and Giulia are the heart and the engine of our pastry shop. In these video interviews they tell you how Bonci goodness comes to life, day after day.
A sweet tooth passed down the generations
Grandpa Beppe left us the recipes of Tuscan tradition and, along with them, the will to look after them and pass them on. Sergio and Silvio turned that same spirit into something new, inventing Panbriacone and teaching us the patience that long leavening demands.
Gianluca and Gianmarco picked up that same curiosity and carried it further still, with the urge to keep inventing. Then came the chocolate, brought in by Michele Mezzasoma, master chocolatier: from Easter eggs to spreads, all the way to dragées, cremini and pralines.
Because what gets handed down from generation to generation, in here, is not just a company. It is the habit of never settling for a cake that is simply good, when it could be irresistible.
And there is one more thing that keeps making the difference, generation after generation: the Bonci mother yeast. In our workshops we look after it every single day, feeding it and waiting for it to do its job. It is the soul of our leavened cakes, what makes them light, wonderfully soft and easy to digest, without a single preservative.
Today Panbriacone lives on in several flavours and formats, but its story, like the story of all our sweets, still starts from the same place: patience, curiosity and the urge to always go one step further.
Always hunting for the next good thing
We Boncis took our grandparents’ patience and matched it with the enthusiasm and curiosity of those who came after. Rushing is not our style: what we care about is creating sweets that make you want the next bite before you have finished this one. To get there we choose few ingredients, natural and top quality, organic wherever possible, with no preservatives, and we work them strictly by hand, the way it has been done in our house for three generations.
We are a family with a sweet tooth, and curiosity is something we never set aside. That is why every year we explore new flavours, new aromas and unexpected pairings: because the most rewarding part of our job is watching the face of someone tasting for the first time and finding something quite different from what they imagined. Something really, really good.
We take the same care over everything that comes with our sweets: the wrapping, the box, every last detail. Because a cake that looks good from the outside is already wanted before it is even opened.
Here we follow one rule only: as long as there is a new pleasure to discover and something good to share, we will keep looking for it.