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When your name recognition is as significant as Italian luxury giant Dolce and Gabbana, it’s safe to say you can take a few risks with what you put on the market. Anything with the Dolce and Gabbana name attached is bound to generate buzz.
But all successful companies know that buzz is short-lived. Continuous success cannot be maintained without continuously satisfying your clients. And you can’t keep continuously satisfying your clients if you don’t provide them with quality products that keep exciting their imagination.
Dolce and Gabbana evidently took their experience with luxury fashion into account when expanding into a new business. They approach their gourmet food and beverage line the same way they approach their Haute Couture collections: a dazzling combination of their signature styles, high-quality materials, and slick, memorable designs that are supposed to make the product look like art first and food second.
Considering their food and beverage line has significantly expanded over the last five years and boasts several recurring seasonal items that are swept off the shelves almost as soon as they appear, it’s safe to say that D&G have succeeded with their new endeavor. But is what they’ve created worth the fanfare around it?
Well, we’re here to provide a complete overview of what Dolce and Gabbana offer to the world's gourmands! And you can always check out their gourmet food online right here at Yammy Bazaar!
How is Dolce and Gabbana Food and Beverage Collection Created?
Honestly, what is more signature Italian than food and wine? We’d say it’s not surprising at all that Dolce and Gabbana delved into the business. There were hints they were interested as early as 2014 when they collaborated with Magnum for the 25th anniversary of the iconic ice cream bar. But they went full-throttle in 2017 when they started collaborating with Pasta di Martino.
That’s the big secret to the success of Dolce and Gabbana's Food & Beverage line: they found partners who were already lauded as some of the best in the business and combined their expertise in the best way possible. Their partners create the consumables under strict guidance, while Dolce and Gabbana work on branding and package designs.
The customers, in the end, get the best of both worlds - great food, great wine, and iconic signature packaging from the luxury fashion house.
Pasta di Martino is the partner Dolce and Gabbana chose to create their pasta line. The brand was established in 1912 and had over a century’s worth of experience making high-quality pasta beloved by Italians when the collaboration started.
Fiasconaro, a Sicilian family-owned bakery, is responsible for pastry collaborations. It was established back in 1953. It became a household name in the 90s when one of the owners, pastry chef Nicola Fiasconaro, reinterpreted classic Italian panettone with Mediterranean flavors, earning the bakery's reputation of an innovative and creative brand.
Perugina is another partner handling the sweets, chocolate to be more precise. Perugina is considered one of Italy’s top chocolate brands, with over a century’s worth of history and one of Italy’s most iconic candies to its name.
Donnafugata was established in 1983, but the history behind it counts almost two centuries. Giacomo Rallo, the creator of Donnafugata, is a fourth-generation winemaker who brought his family’s knowledge to the company. Donnafugata’s wines are bottled and aged in ancient cellars of his family in Marsala. The same two centuries of experience producing high-quality wine have been used to select wines for Dolce and Gabbana partnership.
Now let’s break down the products themselves, what the D&G collection has to offer, and if they’re worth your time as a consumer.
Dolce and Gabbana Pasta
The pasta was Dolce and Gabbana’s first foray into the food world. They signed a deal with Pasta di Martino for a limited-edition pasta collection in early 2017, and the assortment hit the shelves in November of the same year. Dolce and Gabbana were not involved with the pasta recipe itself, that’s all on Pasta di Martino, but they did have a hand in deciding what pasta varieties would be included.
In the end, the collaborative effort settled on four:
Spaghetti - a classic, long and thin cylindrical pasta. One of the most popular pasta shapes in the world.
Paccheri - a tube-shaped pasta with a large hole in the middle. It’s pretty similar to Rigatoni but is overall shorter and wider.
Penne Rigate - classic Penne Rigate is a short, extruded, cylindrical pasta with an angled cut at the end.
Trottole - a short and thick pasta shape reminiscent of a very tightly coiled spring. The name means “spinning top.”
The pasta is made with 100% Italian durum wheat. It’s bronze-drawn and dried slowly at a low temperature to preserve the wheat aroma and ensure its texture has the proper grip.
The D&G handles the packaging design side of the project. The pasta is decorated with a combination of signature Dolce and Gabbana colorful patterns, notable Italian landmarks like Milan Duomo and Leaning Tower of Pisa, and a quirky illustration of a happy family scene at the center of it all: Mother, Father, Grandparents, and children all enjoying a pasta dinner together.
Dolce and Gabbana Sicilian Creams
When Dolce and Gabbana first started collaborating with Sicilian family-owned bakery Fiasconaro to create a luxury version of a classic dessert (more on that one later), a sweet spread was only supposed to be an accompaniment, not the star of the show.
Clearly, the consumer interest determined otherwise because Dolce and Gabbana kept developing new flavors with Fiasconaro:
Sicilian Pistachio Cream was the first to hit the shelves, accompanying the first panettone, the Fiasconaro bakery developed for Dolce and Gabbana. It’s a thick, nutty, and velvety-smooth spread similar to smooth peanut butter in consistency. Made with premium-grade pistachios, it’s flavored with milk powder to add creaminess and seasoned only with sugar and salt. The package is predominantly green, decorated with colorful geometric patterns. The main character of the package is a knight on a horse on the side of the box.
Sicilian Chocolate Cream was the logical continuation. You cannot have a full line of spreads without chocolate flavor, can you now? It’s a smooth mixture of Sicilian chocolate and hazelnut paste, sweetened with cane sugar. The packaging is a deep blue, decorated with blue, white, red, and yellow patterns.
Sicilian Almond Cream was the forgone conclusion, considering the popularity of almond cream. A little less originality, a little more tradition. It’s made similar to pistachio cream, with milk powder for extra creaminess (to differentiate the flavor from all other almond spreads) and a bit of sugar and salt for seasoning. The packaging is red, similarly decorated with colorful patterns. The main character depicted on the side of the box is a young knight in full garb.
Dolce and Gabbana Panettone
The one that kind of officiated the fact that pasta wasn’t a one-off and Dolce and Gabbana would stay in the food industry.
Fiasconaro, the bakery Dolce and Gabbana partnered with in 2018, was already known for its unique panettone recipe. Now the mission was to develop a one-of-a-kind artisanal product, giving a traditional Northern dessert signature Sicilian flair.
Chef Nicola Fiasconaro decided to cover a lot of ground at once and developed not one but two recipes. The first Dolce and Gabbana panettone was a Sicilian pistachio panettone covered in a thick layer of white chocolate and extra pistachios. This version was accompanied by an additional sweet pistachio spread in a small jar (the one that started the D&G sweet spread line!). The second one was a more fruity and spicy alternative for those who weren’t fond of nutty flavors - panettone with candied Sicilian fruits and saffron.
The partnership continued the following year, allowing Chef Nicola to flex his fantasy and baking skills again. Once again, he created two recipes, one with more emphasis on nutty flavors and the second with an accent on fruit and spice (with an extra twist). The first was panettone with candied chestnuts and gianduia (chocolate-hazelnut blend). The second panettone was flavored with candied oranges and raisins, accentuated with Vecchio Samperi wine.
Dolce and Gabbana designed special large and colorful (predominantly in the shades of yellows and oranges) metal tins for panettone, decorated with images of fruit (largely citrus and grapes), flowers, and abstract patterns in bright blues, reds, and greens.
The collaboration between Fiasconaro and D&G continues, so Chef Nicola will likely continue to amaze with new panettone flavors for next Christmas.
Dolce and Gabbana Colomba
Colomba, a traditional Italian Easter cake in the shape of a dove, was added to Dolce and Gabbana food collection in 2021. The recipes were once again developed in collaboration with Fiasconaro Bakery’s Chef Nicola.
Like with panettone, Chef Nicola developed two recipes for D&G Colomba. One with Sicilian candied orange, with sweet icing and Sicilian almonds on top. The other with Sicilian chocolate chips and strawberry jam, covered in a thick layer of chocolate icing and accompanied by a jar of chocolate spread.
In contrast to panettone’s brightly colored tins, the packaging for Colomba was inspired by Sicily's blue and white majolica, looking more subdued and elegant rather than fun. Even the chocolate spread packaging was accordingly redesigned, switching the color palette to resemble Colomba’s tin.
Dolce and Gabbana Wine
The collaboration between Donnafugata and D&G started in 2020 when D&G redesigned the packaging for Donnafugata’s 2016 Tancredi. The new packaging was predominantly blue, with a pattern of white and red rays on the yellow background at the top and bottom, reminiscent of classic Dolce and Gabbana designs.
In June of the same year, Donnafugata and D&G created their first wine in collaboration, Rosa, a rosé. Dolce and Gabbana created a more subdued and elegant packaging, with pink, white, and blue as primary colors and sleek gold detailing.
2021 saw the continuation of their partnership with D&G creating two new package designs for Donnafugata wines. The red Cuordilava 2017 package was decorated with tiny green, blue, and red cubes, while the white Isolano 2019 got a more elaborate package, decorated with colorful geometric patterns in a thick green frame.
Dolce and Gabbana Chocolate
In 2021, Dolce and Gabbana added another iconic partner to their list. This time their chosen collaborator was Italian chocolate manufacturer Perugina, the creator of one of Italy’s most famous chocolate candies. Baci Perugina, the iconic candy in question, was created in 1922 (but was officially named Baci Perugina only in 1924).
The original Baci Perugina consists of a chocolate praline center mixed with hazelnut grains and a whole hazelnut on top, encased in a thick shell of dark chocolate.
In contrast, the limited-edition Dolce and Gabbana Baci Perugina consist of a gianduja center with lemon nibs, a whole hazelnut, and a thick white chocolate outer shell.
While reminiscent of the original, the packaging has a signature Dolce and Gabbana flair. While the original Baci Perugina packaging is solid blue, the D&G edition boasts a colorful box with solid red sides decorated with yellow, blue, green, and red triangles. While the original candies are wrapped in silver foil, the D&G has a predominantly yellow foil with blue-red-white squares.
All pictures are sourced from official Dolce and Gabbana platforms