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FOOD AND DRINK

Offal and midnight pastries: Six surprising Italian food customs

You may think you're an expert on Italian cuisine - but there are some traditions that will come as a surprise to anyone who's yet to experience Italy's food culture up close.

Italian pastries: not just for daytime.
Italian pastries: not just for daytime. Photo by Gene Gallin on Unsplash

You’ve learned to keep cream out of your carbonara, and that meatballs on spaghetti is an American invention.

But there are some Italian food customs that you probably won’t pick up on until you’ve spent some time in Italy.

Whipped cream on ice cream

If you’ve ever looked down at your ice cream and thought “this isn’t bad, but what it really needs is more cream”, then Italy is the country for you.

Up and down the length of the peninsula, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a gelateria whose servers don’t offer to put panna, or whipped cream, on top of your gelato.

When and where this tradition began is unclear, but the fact that in Milan it costs extra while in Rome and the south it tends to be free has been the subject of some controversy in the past, with Italian media dubbing the dispute “panna-gate“.

Sauceless pasta

You might think you like pasta…but can you really declare yourself a true pasta-lover unless you’ve tried – and loved – pasta without any sauce on it?

Pasta aglio olio e peperoncino, or pasta (specifically spaghetti, linguine or some other long pasta) with garlic, oil and chilli pepper flakes is a dish that originated in Naples and quickly became popular all over the country as a low-cost, low-effort meal.

While you wouldn’t be surprised to hear this kind of food is regularly served in people’s homes, it’s also not uncommon to find it on the menu in informal restaurants, where diners will part with good money for a plate of pasta with oil and garlic (and maybe some chilli and parsley) on it.

Even more basic is pasta in bianco – in its purest form, plain pasta with a pat of butter on it, and if you’re lucky some cheese – though you’re unlikely to find this offered in a restaurant. Related options include pasta with olive oil and bitter greens, and pasta with butter and asparagus.

Potato on pizza

A country for keto dieters, Italy is not. 

Carbs are king here, so it was only a matter of time before someone came up with the idea of putting potato and pizza together.

Despite how bland it sounds, pizza con patate is actually delicious – a thick and crispy white pizza bianca base topped with well-seasoned, thinly sliced potatoes sprinkled with rosemary.

READ ALSO: Five tips for ordering pizza in Italy

You won’t tend to find this option on the menu at sit-down pizzerias – but go into any bakery serving up trays of pizza al taglio, or pizza by the slice, and you’re bound to see potato pizza sitting alongside margherita and focaccia.

Biscuits dipped in wine

The British are partial to biscuits dipped in tea on occasion, but Italians prefer an altogether more decadent variation: biscuits soaked in wine.

Dipping cantucci (the crunchy dried biscuit that most anglophones refer to as ‘biscotti’) in sweet vin santo dessert wine after a meal is a Tuscan tradition, but it’s popular enough that you’ll see it on the menu at plenty of restaurants in other regions.

The legend goes that vin santo – ‘holy wine’ – is so named because in the 1300s, as a plague swept through Italy, a Franciscan friar in Siena started giving his parishioners altar wine in the hopes of curing them. While the medical science is questionable, a sip of the wine did provide some relief – so much so that people started believing in its miraculous properties.

As for where the custom of dipping biscuits in the wine came from – people probably just realised it tasted nice.

Midnight pastries

If you’re the kind of person who starts craving breakfast at midnight, you’ll want to head to certain southern Italian cities where some bakeries turn out cornetti and other pastries into the early hours.

Don’t expect to find these kinds of nocturnal or 24-hour bakeries in touristy neighbourhoods or the fancier parts of town; they traditionally tend to be based a bit further out, and cater mainly to workers starting or coming off their shift or students who are up all hours of the night.

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

That doesn’t mean they’re not worth making the journey to if you’re a night owl. An institution like Il Pangocciolaio, for example, in Rome’s Ostiense neighbourhood, serves cream-stuffed sweet breads and mini-pizzas from 7pm until between 3 and 5 in the morning, and is rarely without a lengthy queue outside its door.

Offal

Italians are not squeamish when it comes to offcuts; from tripe to oxtail to tongue and even brains, you can pretty much guarantee that if it comes from an animal and is edible, in some part of Italy, it’s regularly used in cooking.

READ ALSO: From fried brains to ‘sexy’ cakes: The Italian foods you might not expect in Italy

Roman cuisine is particularly known for its emphasis on offal, but it’s far from the only part of the country where you’ll find unusual food items; from Tuscany, where lampredotto cow stomach is a popular sandwich filling, to a range of southern regions where pig’s blood is traditionally used to make the sanguinaccio dolce chocolate dessert.

A new year’s eve delicacy from Emilia Romagna is zampone – a pig’s trotter stuffed with pork meat – while in Puglia and in Catania on Sicily’s eastern coast, you’ll find horse meat widely available at food stalls and in restaurants.

Member comments

  1. I asked for linguine with aglio olio e peperoncino,in my local restaurant only to be told in no uncertain terms, “NO! You must always use spaghetti for this dish.

    While we are on the subject of plain pasta dishes, my local restaurant also serves pasta with sage and butter. Delicious.

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LEARNING ITALIAN

The essential vocabulary you’ll need to dine out in Italy

Waiters in Italy's big cities and holiday hotspots often have a good command of English, but that's not always the case in the rest of the country. Here is some key Italian vocabulary to help you enjoy a smooth dining experience.

The essential vocabulary you'll need to dine out in Italy

Dining out is one of the best ways to explore Italy’s famous cuisine and one of the experiences tourists most look forward to when visiting the country.

Generally speaking, waiting staff at most restaurants in major cities and holiday hotspots around Italy will have at least some basic knowledge of English, meaning you’ll be able to order your meal in inglese without any particular issues. 

But that might not be the case in less visited areas of the peninsula, or in less popular establishments, where waiters may not be used to foreign clientele and may not be confident English speakers. 

Whether you’re dealing with staff with a not-so-great command of English, or are simply tempted to put your Italian skills to the test and order food and drinks in the local language, there are some key words and phrases that you’ll need to be familiar with to enjoy a smooth dining experience in Italy.

Choosing your restaurant

Picking the right spot for a lunch (pranzo) or dinner (cena) can be hard without some basic knowledge of all the different kinds of restaurants available in the country and their names. 

Though the precise distinction between ristoranti, trattorie, osterie and agriturismi isn’t always clear to Italians either, each establishment has some unique features. Knowing this will help you make the best choice for the occasion at hand. 

READ ALSO: Trattoria to osteria: Explaining the different restaurants in Italy

Reserving a table

Once you’ve picked the restaurant, it’s strongly advisable that you book (prenotare) a table (un tavolo). 

Italian restaurants can get extremely busy, especially over the summer and on or around national public holidays, which means it’s always best to book a spot well in advance to avoid being told “Scusi, siamo al completo/siamo pieni” (Sorry, we’re fully booked) at a later date. 

Some restaurants may allow you to book online, either through their website or via external online platforms or apps, but this is definitely not the case for all venues.

Should calling the restaurant be the only option, you can simply say: “Vorrei riservare un tavolo per (numero) persone alle (ora) di (giorno),” which translates as “I’d like to reserve a table for (number) people at (time) on (day)”.

To confirm the reservation, you’ll in most cases be asked to provide your name (nome) or surname (cognome) and mobile phone number (numero di cellulare).

If the restaurant has an outdoor seating area, you may also be asked if you’d like to eat indoors (dentro or all’interno) or outdoors (fuori or all’esterno).

Ordering food and drinks

Once at the restaurant, the first thing you’ll have to do is let the restaurant manager or waiting staff know that you have a reservation. 

You can do so by saying: “Ho una prenotazione per (ora) con nome (nome)”, which means “I have a reservation for (time) with name (your name)”.

Once seated, you’ll be given a menu (menù in Italian – note the accent on the ‘u’) and usually be given some bread (pane) or breadsticks (grissini) to snack on while you decide what to eat or drink.

In most cases, these won’t be free of charge (you’ll see them billed as pane or coperto) but you can turn them down with a simple “No, grazie” (No, thank you).

READ ALSO: ‘A rip-off’: Should you really get mad about Italy’s table charge?

In most restaurants in big cities and popular tourist hotspots, menus will be available in both English and Italian.

If that’s not the case, you can ask the waiter (cameriere) to explain what the items you’re not familiar with are: “Che cosa c’e’ in questo piatto?” (What’s in this dish?) or “Che ingrediente e’ questo?” (What ingredient is this?).

Or you may ask for their English translation (traduzione in inglese).

The menu will likely be divided into the following sections: antipasti (appetisers), primi (first courses), secondi (second courses), contorni (sides), dolci (desserts), bevande alcoliche (alcoholic drinks) and bevande analcoliche (soft drinks).

If you’re looking for recommendations on what to order (ordinare), you can ask your waiter: “Cosa mi consigli da bere/da mangiare?” (What do you suggest I eat/drink?).

You can also ask how big portions are (“Quanto sono grandi le porzioni?”) if you’re afraid you may order more than you can possibly take on.

READ ALSO: Antipasto to amaro: What to expect from every step of an Italian dinner

If you need some more time to look at the menu, you can say: “Mi serve un altro po’ di tempo”.

To order, simply say “Io prendo…” (I’ll take) followed by your order. 

Particular requests

Whether you need an extra plate, new cutlery or another napkin, you can just ask: “Possiamo avere…?” followed by what you need and per favore (please). 

Here are some useful terms to know.

Posate (cutlery): forchetta (fork), coltello (knife), cucchiaio (spoon), cucchiaino (tea spoon).

Stoviglie (tableware): piatto fondo (soup plate), piatto piano (dinner plate), vassoio (tray), piattino (side plate), bicchiere (glass), caraffa (jug), bottiglia (bottle), tovagliolo (napkin), salviette (wipes).

Asking for the bill

Italian waiters don’t normally like to hurry their customers and it’s perfectly acceptable to linger and chat over the dregs of the wine after finishing your meal.

READ ALSO: The etiquette around paying your restaurant bill in Italy

When you’re ready to pay the bill, try to catch the waiter’s eye and ask: “Possiamo avere il conto?

You’ll have the option to pay at the counter (alla cassa) or at the table (al tavolo), in cash (contanti) or by card (carta).

Though tipping isn’t required or expected in Italy, you can still leave a tip (mancia) if you were particularly happy with the service (servizio) or the food you consumed.

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