This article investigates the role that Italian food companies like Barilla pasta played in creating narratives of East African empire at the apex of the Fascist ventennio. It aims to use the commercial remnants of Fascist empire to provide a more thorough accounting of how colonialism shaped the modern cultural history of Italian pasta. To do so, I analyze the paper ephemera, that is, the pasta advertisements and packaging, that connected occupied East Africa to Italy, demonstrating how regime projects to promote grain evolved into corporate projects in private industry. I argue that these two stories form a single cohesive narrative, one that can unite much of the excellent work that has been done on Fascist agriculture in empire with the transnational history of Italian food companies. East African empire, as depicted by Italian pasta shapes and advertisements, was consumable. At stake in this inquiry lies the shifting question of Italian national identity, framed by food products in global contexts.

本文调查了像 Barilla 意大利面这样的意大利食品公司在创造法西斯ventennio顶点的东非帝国叙事中所扮演的角色. 它旨在利用法西斯帝国的商业残余，更全面地说明殖民主义如何塑造意大利面食的现代文化史。为此，我分析了将被占领的东非与意大利连接起来的纸制品，即面食广告和包装，展示了促进粮食发展的政权项目如何演变为私营企业的企业项目。我认为这两个故事构成了一个单一的连贯叙述，可以将帝国法西斯农业所做的许多优秀工作与意大利食品公司的跨国历史结合起来。正如意大利面食形状和广告所描绘的那样，东非帝国是可消费的。在这项调查中，关键在于意大利民族身份的不断变化的问题，在全球背景下由食品构成。