Ciabatta
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| Type | Bread flour |
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| Place of origin | Italy |
| Region or state | Veneto |
| Created by | Francesco Favaron |
| Main ingredients | Wheat flour or whole wheat flour, yeast |
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Ciabatta (Italian pronunciation: [tʃaˈbatta], literally slipper bread) is an Italian white bread made from wheat flour, water, salt, and yeast, created in 1982 by a baker in Verona, Veneto, Italy, in response to the popularity of French baguettes. Ciabatta is somewhat elongated, broad, and flat, and is baked in many variations.
While panino indicates any kind of sandwich regardless of the bread used (whether slices or a bun), a toasted sandwich made from small loaves of ciabatta is known as panini (plural of panino) outside Italy.
Ciabatta was first produced in 1982 by Francesco Favaron, a baker from Verona, in collaboration with Molini Adriesi who provided the flour to produce the bread. Favaron named the bread ciabatta as he said that the shape of the bread reminded him of the slipper (ciabatta) of his wife Andreina.
Cavallari, owner of Molini Adriesi, called the bread ciabatta Polesano after Polesine, the area he lived in, and registered it as a trademark. The recipe was subsequently licensed by Cavallari's company, Molini Adriesi, to bakers in 11 countries by 1999.
Many regions have their own variations on the original recipe or a bread that closely resembles ciabatta and has become accepted as a variety of ciabatta; the ciabatta from the area encompassing Lake Como has a crisp crust, a somewhat soft, porous texture, and is light to the touch.
The ciabatta found in Tuscany, Umbria, and Marche varies from bread that has a firm crust and dense crumb, to bread that has a crisper crust and more open texture, and in Rome, it is often seasoned with marjoram.
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