Guinness declares the longest baguette at 400 feet in Italy

MILAN -- A judge from Guinness World Records has certified a 400-foot-long baguette baked at the Milan Expo 2015 World's Fair as the longest in the world.

About 60 French and Italian bakers worked nearly seven hours Sunday to bake the French bread characterized by its soft middle and crusty exterior, methodically moving a specially designed portable oven along the length of the doughy preparation.

The bakers worked at a rate of 66 feet an hour, their progress complicated by working outdoors and the challenge to avoid any breakage.

"It's very difficult to do a big baguette because ... it's cold and we are outside, so for the dough it's not easy," said Dominique Anract, one of the bakers and owner of the La Pompadour bakery in Paris. Putting a plastic cover over the dough helped.

The Italian maker of Nutella, Ferrero, backed the enterprise to beat the 364-foot record held by a French supermarket chain.

Once certified as a record-breaker, the baguette was cut and smeared with Nutella to share with the hundreds of Expo attendees who celebrated the record.

It was at least the fourth world record declared during the six-month Expo, which closes Oct. 31, including the longest pizza at nearly a mile long.