Maritozzi, the Roman cream buns, are everywhere right now. Here’s where to find them.
The age-old pastry is popping up throughout the city, and Philadelphians are here for puffy buns stuffed with sweet cream.
When Saif Manna and his partner, Stefaniya Surikova, strolled into Vita on a weekend afternoon for scoops of gelato, the owners of the Rittenhouse gelateria, Massimo and Ana Boni, sparked a conversation with the local baker. The following day, Manna, who runs Manna’s Bakery out of a commissary kitchen, brought samples of the Italian pastry called maritozzi for the Bonis to try. They instantly fell in love with the light, airy football-shaped cream-filled brioche buns and added them to the gelato shop’s refrigerated display case of cakes, Basque cheesecakes, and cannoli.
A symbol of good faith and love, maritozzi (plural for maritozzo, which is pronounced mari-totz-zo) date back to the Middle Ages in Rome, offered as a treat during Lent and as marriage proposal gifts, according to Saveur.
The age-old Italian pastry is popping up more frequently lately in Philly’s food scene, from a citrus maritozzo on a Roma-inspired menu at an underground supper club like Couch Cafe to pistachio-coated vanilla mascarpone ones to be offered at pop-up bakeries like Downtime Bakery for Valentine’s Day. . And Philadelphians are here for the various iterations of puffy buns stuffed with sweet cream.
“There’s something to the fresh brioche, like the butteriness of it, that complements the sweetness [of the cream] so incredibly well,” Massimo Boni said. “It’s just such a pleasant treat.”
Where to find maritozzi in Philly?
Take chefs Justine MacNeil and Ed Crochet of the Fishtown bakery Fiore. The couple bopped around Italy last spring exploring pastries throughout the country and found maritozzi in different shapes and textures, with each dough as flavorful as the next.
MacNeil, the brains behind the pastries, adds rum to the pasty’s dough for flavor. The dough is made a day in advance, and baked the next morning. After they cool, the buns get a slash down the middle to make room for sweetened whipped cream.
“There was more flavor and structure to the dough [in Italy], while also still being light and complementing the cream well,” Crochet said. “That’s kind of a line that we’re trying to tow [at Fiore].”
📍2413 Frankford Ave., Phila., Pa., 19125, 🌐 fiore-finefoods.com, 💸 $5
Over in Bella Vista, chefs at the Italian pop-up turned brick-and-mortar Paffuto layer homemade jam between the cream in their maritozzi.
Split the pastry in half and you’ll see a pretty double layer of cranberry jam and whipped cream with a touch of vanilla, lemon zest, and powdered sugar. Jam flavors rotate every two weeks — co-owner/chef Dan Griffiths says to look for persimmon next.
The inspiration to add the pastry to the menu came from chef/co-owner Jake Loeffler’s travels. “He was out in Italy and was like, ‘Whoa, I love this thing [maritozzi],’ and brought it back here,” Griffiths said. “I think there’s beauty in the simplicity of it.”
📍1009 S. Eighth St, Phila., Pa., 19147, 🌐 paffutophl.com, 💸 $6
Following his Levantine-inspired bakery’s philosophy, Manna’s maritozzi incorporate flavors and ingredients from his culture. The white chocolate pistachio cream in the airy brioche bun at Vita highlights the nut commonly used in desserts in the region made up of Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan.
“I think that’s a common theme around the Mediterranean — you’ll see pistachios in desserts in Greece and Italy as well,” he said. “That’s where you see the crossroads, that connection and alignment between trade and the proliferation of cuisine — you see common flavors.”
Manna’s brioche is pillowy and subtly sweet with a maximum shelf life of three days. That’s because he uses the Japanese yudane method to make his dough, where boiling water gelatinizes the flour to trap moisture and keep it soft and airy for a bit longer.
He’s working on orange blossom caramelized honey maritozzi, incorporating the popular Levant ingredient orange blossom water into the cream with a freshly made honeycomb candy atop the pastry. Gearing up for spring flavors with homemade jams, lovebirds get to experience a fruity maritozzi for Valentine’s Day featuring strawberry jam in the center of a vanilla cream-filled bun topped with a chocolate-covered strawberry.
📍1324 N. Broad St, Phila., Pa., 🌐 instagram.com/mannabakery1324, 💸 $33 for a box of six
Manna’s maritozzi also fly off the shelves at Vita, which offers Manna’s buns filled with a scoop of gelato and pressed into an Uncrustables-like pastry called brioche con gelato. Owner Massimo Boni recommends pairing the maritozzi with a hot cappuccino.
“[The maritozzo] is genuinely what gives me the most temptation out of like everything — how badly do I really need an $8 [pastry],” Boni said. “It’s 100% worth [the price].”
📍261 S. 17th St., Phila., Pa., 19103, 🌐 vitainphilly.com, 💸 $8