Real Italian, part 1 of 3. This time there’s only one topic: food.
Today we learn the names of the dishes, the ingredients in them and the few words you need to talk about them. Walking in, ordering a whole dinner, asking for the bill: that’s the next episode.
The setting is Puglia, in southern Italy: the heel of the boot, a land of sea, olive groves and white towns. Its cooking uses few ingredients and has clean flavors, which is why it suits so many palates from Asia.
1. The three you won’t forget
Puglia has dozens of dishes, but you don’t need to know them all. These three, though, are Puglia itself. Eat just these and you can say you’ve tasted the region.
Orecchiette alle cime di rapa — orecchiette with turnip tops
Little ear-shaped pasta, each one made by hand, served with slightly bitter greens. The signature dish of Puglia. If you choose just one, choose this.
Burrata
Mozzarella outside, cream and shredded cheese inside: cut it with a knife and the heart flows onto the plate. It was born in the town of Andria, and you eat it well chilled, with bread.
Panzerotto
A half-moon of fried dough filled with tomato and mozzarella. You buy it in the street and eat it hot while you walk. The inside is always scalding.
2. The others you’ll find
Not a list to memorise: these are the dishes you’ll actually see on an ordinary evening.
Focaccia barese — Bari-style focaccia
A soft, thick bread topped with cherry tomatoes and olives, rich with olive oil. Eaten at any time of day, even on the go.
Tiella di riso, patate e cozze
Layers of rice, potatoes and mussels baked together in the oven. A rice dish is rare in Italy, so visitors from Asia are usually surprised.
Puccia
A bread from Salento: a round loaf with almost no crumb, cut open and stuffed. An easy lunch by the sea.
Pasticciotto
A pastry from Lecce: shortcrust filled with custard. You eat it in the morning, still warm from the oven. It’s the town’s breakfast.
Frisella
A hard ring-shaped bread. You dip it quickly in water, then top it with tomato, oil and oregano. Puglia’s summer food.
Cartellate
Strips of dough rolled into rosettes, fried and soaked in honey or vincotto (cooked grape must). Made at home at Christmas.
If you see them on the menu, taralli (small savory bread rings), bombette (meat rolls grilled over charcoal) and fave e cicoria (broad bean purée with bitter greens) are also worth trying.
3. How to read a menu
An Italian menu is always divided in the same way. Knowing these five headings is more useful than knowing dish names, because they tell you which stage of the meal you’re at.
antipasto — starter
The first thing you eat, cold or warm. Burrata goes here.
primo — first course (pasta, rice)
Pasta, rice, soup. Orecchiette and tiella go here.
secondo — second course (meat, fish)
Meat or fish. It comes on its own: vegetables are ordered separately.
contorno — side dish
Vegetables to go with the second course, served on a separate plate.
dolce — dessert
The last thing you eat. Puglia’s pasticciotto, though, is more breakfast than evening dessert.
You don’t have to order everything. Just a first course, or just a starter and a dessert, is fine. Nobody will think it’s odd.
4. The words of food
Ten ingredient words. They appear in almost every dish, so with these alone you’ll understand half of a Puglian menu.
pane — bread
olio d'oliva — olive oil
pomodoro — tomato
formaggio — cheese
verdura — vegetables
pesce — fish
cozze — mussels
carne — meat
riso — rice
pasta — pasta
And ten words for how food is cooked and how it tastes. You’ll find them on the menu, and the waiter will use them too.
crudo — raw
cotto — cooked
al forno — baked in the oven
alla griglia — grilled
fritto — fried
fresco — fresh, just made
dolce — sweet
salato — savory, salty
amaro — bitter
piccante — spicy hot
Two of these words have two meanings. dolce means “sweet” and “dessert”; fresco means “fresh” and “cool”.
5. Drinks
Wherever you go, the first thing they ask is about water: naturale (still) or frizzante (sparkling). In between there is also leggermente frizzante (lightly sparkling).
Nobody uses the long version, though. In a restaurant, leggermente alone is enough.
Un'acqua leggermente, per favore.
Lightly sparkling water, please.
vino rosso — red wine
Here, two names are all you need: Primitivo and Negroamaro. Full-bodied reds born near the sea.
latte di mandorla — almond milk
A southern Italian drink: not alcoholic, served cold. If you don’t drink wine, in Puglia have this.
caffè — coffee (espresso)
In Italy, caffè always means espresso: strong, in a small cup, drunk at the end of the meal.
6. Questions to understand a dish
Four questions, all about food only. They’re not for ordering or paying (that’s the next episode): they’re for finding out what’s in front of you.
When there’s a word on the menu you don’t know: point at it and ask.
Che cos'è?
What is this?
When you want to know what’s inside: out of curiosity, and also when there’s something you can’t eat.
Cosa c'è dentro?
What’s in it?
When you want to know if it’s fish, meat or vegetables. Put the word after “È”: di pesce (fish), di carne (meat), di verdura (vegetables).
È di pesce?
Is it a fish dish?
To know how it’s cooked, use the words from the previous section.
È crudo o cotto?
Is it raw or cooked?
Italians love talking about food. No waiter minds questions about a dish: in fact, that’s when their face lights up.
This week’s practice
1. Choose three dishes and learn their names. You don’t need all of them.
2. Say where those three go among the five menu headings (antipasto / primo / secondo / contorno / dolce).
3. From the “cooking and taste words”, choose one that fits each dish. For example: crudo, al forno, amaro.
4. Make sure you can say Che cos'è? out loud. It’s the phrase you’ll use most this time.
5. At the Wednesday conversation we’ll talk about these three dishes. If you can’t remember them, it’s fine to look at the PDF below.
Printable PDF
Below is this episode’s one-page PDF, with the dishes, the food words, the menu headings and the four questions. Download it, print it and carry it with you.
Every Wednesday at 9 pm Japan time we talk Italian online for an hour. Free, no booking needed, and you’re welcome to just listen.
Photos of the dishes (Wikimedia Commons): orecchiette / Romainbehar (CC0), burrata / Popo le Chien (CC0), panzerotto / DinaBenedettoFerrandina (CC0), focaccia / Simona.IT (CC BY-SA 4.0), tiella / Markx89 (CC BY 4.0), puccia / Bultro (CC BY-SA 4.0), pasticciotto / Renano (CC BY-SA 3.0), frisella / Floriano Calcagnile (CC BY-SA 3.0), cartellate / Horcrux (CC BY-SA 4.0)
