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FOOD AND DRINK

Amaro, mirto, grappa: Do you know Italy’s most popular digestifs?

Drinking a digestif after a large lunch or dinner is something of a ritual in Italy, but which are the most popular post-meal tipples in the country?

Published: 23 February 2024 15:57 CET
Updated: 3 March 2024 05:56 CET
Grappa, Italy
Bottles of grappa displayed at the Vinitaly exposition in Verona in March 2012. Photo by VINCENZO PINTO / AFP

Meals in Italy are no trifling matter, especially when it comes to Sunday get-togethers with family and friends or big celebrations such as birthdays, weddings and graduation parties.

But the unconscionably large quantities of food consumed on these occasions can often leave diners with an unpleasantly heavy stomach, which is why many Italians resort to drinking a digestivo – a highly alcoholic, intensely flavoured liqueur believed to provide digestive aid – at the end of the meal. 

Though there is a huge variety of digestivi, with preferences largely varying from region to region, there are some national favourites which you can expect to find in most restaurants around the country. 

Amaro

Amaro is an umbrella term for a large variety of herbal liqueurs with a distinctive bittersweet taste. 

These liqueurs have an alcohol content percentage generally ranging from 15 to 35 percent, and high sugar content, which means they are usually more dense and viscous than ordinary spirits. 

They can be served at room temperature, chilled or over ice.

READ ALSO: Aperol and aperitivo: A guide to visiting bars and cafes in Italy

Italian favourites include: Braulio, from Lombardy’s Valtellina valley; Averna, from Caltanissetta, Sicily; Montenegro, produced from a blend of 40 botanicals in Bologna; and Fernet Branca, which was originally sold as a cure for cholera but has since been downgraded to beverage purposes alone.

Limoncello

This sweet, lemon-based liqueur is one of Italy’s best-known digestivi and one of the most appreciated Italian spirits abroad. 

It’s made by macerating lemon peels in sugar and alcohol and served chilled. 

One of the most renowned limoncello brands in Italy is Sorrento-based Villa Massa, but plenty of other options are available.

Limoncello is also a very popular homemade liqueur. When life gives you lemons…

Sambuca

Sambuca is an anise-flavoured, colourless digestif. 

The main ingredient is star anise but notes of elderflower, liquorice or citrus are often present.

Sambuca can be served on its own but can also be added to an espresso shot to make caffé corretto (literally, ‘corrected coffee’).

The best-known sambuca brand is Rome-based Molinari, which first became popular in the bars of the capital’s elegant Via Veneto during the 1950s and 60s.

Grappa

Grappa is again an umbrella term referring to a variety of highly alcoholic spirits (anything from 35 to 60 percent of alcohol content) obtained from grape pomace, i.e. the solid remains (skins, pulp, seeds and stems) of wine grapes after they’ve been pressed. 

It’s usually colourless, but can also be pale to deep yellow based on differences in ageing. 

Much like sambuca, it can be added to a shot of espresso to create a caffe’ corretto or can be served neat on its own.

One of Italy’s most famous grappa producers is Marolo, located in Alba, Piedmont.

Mirto

Mirto is a sweet liqueur made from macerated myrtle berries and leaves. 

It’s most commonly produced in Sardinia, where myrtle plants grow spontaneously in the Mediterranean scrub.

You can choose between mirto rosso, made from berries of the black variety, and mirto bianco, made from berries of the white variety.

Like limoncello, it’s best served cold.

This is a non-exhaustive list of popular Italian digestivi. Have we missed your favourite digestif? Let us know in the comments below.

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OPINION

Doggy bags and sharing plates: Why Italy’s last food-related taboos are dying out

Italy is famous for its strong culinary traditions and unwritten rules around eating, but as Italians embrace doggy bags and informal dining, Silvia Marchetti argues that the last food-related taboos have been broken.

Published: 25 April 2024 09:40 CEST
Updated: 28 April 2024 08:31 CEST
Doggy bags and sharing plates: Why Italy's last food-related taboos are dying out

Italians are deadly serious when it comes to eating or, as they say, “mettere le gambe sotto il tavolo”, meaning ‘putting your feet under the table’.

Three meals per day remain sacrosanct at home, but at restaurants the eating etiquette is changing, particularly in big cities where globalisation has an effect.

I recently discovered, much to my surprise, that Italians are embracing doggy bags. When I was a kid, many many years ago, to us Italians it always seemed like something only foreigners could do, especially Americans.

We would never have asked a waiter to give us a paper bag to bring away the food for the next day, it just would never have popped up in our minds: you eat what you are served and if you no longer wanted what you’d paid for, well too bad, you’ll leave it on the plate. It would’ve been embarrassing to walk away with a doggy bag.

So I was shocked when recently at a restaurant in Rome I saw Italians taking away bags of leftover lunch food, including cold pizza slices and meatballs. It almost knocked me off my chair.

READ ALSO: Are doggy bags still taboo in Italy’s restaurants?

When the waitress came to our table to bring the cheque, and saw that we hadn’t finished our fried  fish and spaghetti alle vongole, she asked if we wanted a doggy bag. My jaw dropped. It was a first for me.

Yet what really shocked me was that the restaurant was not in the city centre, but in the countryside where traditions tend to survive, or at the very least, take longer to die.

It struck me how it’s no longer foreigners asking for doggy bags, but even Italians have overcome the stigma of this former faux pas.

The sad truth is that it’s not just because of globalisation and the economic crisis following the pandemic. There’s been a fall in the cultural level of many Italians, so asking for a doggy bag is also a way to avoid having to cook for the evening or for the day after, rather than to save money.

Sadly, this trend is not an exception, nor a one-off, and in Italy it’s not driven by concerns over food waste (we’re really not that ‘green’) or the cost of living.

Italian restaurants are simply becoming more generically European and international, adapting to global habits and the requests of foreign clientele.

In Rome’s touristy spots, restaurants showcase photos of dishes outside the restaurant to lure customers, or display real plates of gluey carbonara. This is something I had never seen in my childhood.

I have noticed that other restaurant eating taboos and etiquette rules have fallen away, too.

A few (well-off) friends of mine bring their own bottles of wine along when they eat out so that they don’t have to pay for these at the restaurant. I find this very inappropriate, but it usually happens when the restaurant owner and customers are friends or know each other.

READ ALSO: Want to eat well in Italy? Here’s why you should ditch the cities

Trends in restaurant etiquette are changing. There are eateries that serve pizza at lunch, which used to be something you could only order for dinner unless you’re in Naples.

The standard three courses which we normally have are also being messed up: appetisers, first, second and side dishes are eaten in a disorderly way – something which would make my granny turn in her grave.

I have seen Italian families first order a T-bone steak and then pasta or a slice of pizza, while many couples share plates. The man orders one type of spaghetti dish, the woman orders another kind of spaghetti and half-way through the meal they switch dishes. This was something very unusual in the past. Before in restaurant there were boundaries in eating habits and in the eating culture, which are now blurring.

My parents taught me it is rude to poke your fork into someone else’s plate to curl up some spaghetti for yourself. My dad always looked sideways at anyone who did that: not only is it extremely improper, he thinks, but it is also very unhygienic.

There are no more rules left in Italian restaurants nowadays, and all taboos have been broken.

To adapt to foreign clients many restaurants tend to stay open the whole day, especially in very touristy areas, and the untouchable hours of lunch and dinner now overlap. Some taverns even serve breakfast.

READ ALSO: Why do Italians get so angry if you mess with classic recipes?

In the north, I’ve noticed that bread and extra-virgin olive oil are often missing from the table and you have to ask for them, which is something very atypical of Italian standards.

To find the traditional Italian eating code in restaurants where there are rules that will never die, one must go deep into unknown spots, and travel to remote villages no one has ever heard of. It’s always harder to find such authentic, untouched places.

I really hate to say this, but wherever there is mass tourism local traditions tend to die, particularly food-related ones.

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