Afew years back, pastry executive Alberto Bauli spoke with a heightened sense of panic during a press conference for an Italian consortium of bakers and confectioners. “Seven out of 10 Americans buying an ‘Italian-style’ panettone are getting a fake,” he proclaimed.

Panettone—the world-famous, yeast-leavened cake, whose sales reach their peak during the weeks before Christmas—had been forced into “unfair competition,” cried Bauli, with inferior knock-offs baked abroad. Italy produces more than 7,100 tons of panettone each year—about ten percent of which is sold internationally.