Gold of Pisa

Do not be distracted by the surrounding stuff, our subject is the round yellow thing just in the middle of the photo: this is a real “teglia di torta” (pan of chickpea pie). Trillian already explained something about “torta” in a post about the “cinque e cinque”, now let's talk of history, or more probably of legends.
One of these legends says that “torta” was created purely by chance and hunger in 1284, after Genoa defeated Pisa in the battle of Meloria, just in front of Livorno. Returning home the Genoese ships were hit by a storm and, inside the hold, overturned barrels of oil and broken sacks of chickpeas mixed with some salt water.
Being on limited supplies and notoriously parsimonious, the Genoese salvaged what they could and the sailors were served a sort of oily chickpea soup. Trying to make the dish more edible someone left it in the sun to dry, with palatable results. Derisively the sailors called it Pisa's Gold. Back to to Genoa, they greatly improved the new dish baking it in a real oven: the “farinata” or “fainé”, as they call it in Genoa, was born. The new dish was soon known all along the coast: in Pisa is now called “cecìna” and in Nice “socca”.
Variants to this legend have the Pisan prisoners from the battle discovering the magic mix, or even hungry roman legionaries left without floor concocting it centuries before.

See also: Five and five
External links: Farinata (Wikipedia)