CalabriaGastronomy
Hotels Calabria
Restaurants Typical Products Services Leisure Time
Calabrian cuisine is natural and immaginative, with strong and sharp flavours, a remarkable mix of the various
cultures which have found home in the region over the centuries. Pasta is generally made at home and there are as many
types of pasta as there are pasta sauces. These sauces are nearly always prepared using beef, veal, pork, lamb, patiently
and carefully cooked in a home-made tomato puree and conserved with extra virgin olive oil. This is then further flavoured
and spiced with some local chilli. In Calabria's mountain villages, you must try the various mushroom dishes which are
prepared using the fragrant pore mushroom of the Sila or the rosito mushroom. The many varieties of mushroom are well
suited to the Calabrian cuisine with its many tasty recipes whose poverty is only apparent and only enhances the flavours
without altering them. Meat is generally cooked in a sauce or roasted. Roast kid with potatoes and embellished with peas and
artichokes depending on the season is a particular delight. It is not rare for the countless vegetables and home-grown
products proffered as side dishes to eclipse the main dish: stuffed aubergines and stewed peppers often act as a foil to
conserves prepared with the same vegetables. In the coastal zones on the Tyrrhenian and Ionian Seas, fish is also important
in Calabrian cuisine. Tuna and the thousands of ways of preparing swordfish, fried locally-caught fish, soups, fish in sauce
and the various types of oven-baked rolls are all dishes no visitor should leave Calabria without having tried. Of
Calabria's cakes, the most characteristics is undoubtedly the cozzupa which is always shaped as an animal or a human or a
basket or a heart. The mixture is that for ciambelle or ring- shaped cakes and it is baked after having been decorated
with eggs fixed with a small cross. The list of Calabrian cakes is very long; honey torrone (nougat), or compittu,
mostaccioli, nepitelli (cakes stuffed with nuts, sultanas, chocolate and spices), pitte 'nchiuse, grain and ricotta cottage
cheese tarts. Calabria's cheeses and salami are in a class of their own, Among the cheeses, the most renowned are the
provolone cheese from Sila and the cheese produced at Monte Poro near Vibo Valentia. The range of salamis include sausages,
brawn, and capicollo salami, Calabria’s wines have a tradition which dates back many hundreds of years. The most well-known
is Ciro which is produced in the area of the same name near Crotone and was offered to eminent guests of Magna Graecia and
to the athletes who won in the Olympic Games, Other, less well-known Calabrian wines are those produced in the zones of
Sibari, Cosenza and Reggio Calabria, DOC Calabrian wines include: Bivongi, Ciro, Crati, Greco di Bianco, Lamezia, Melissa,
Pollino, Savuto, Wines from the zones of Vibo and Rossano also well worth a try.
At Calabria, there is tourist accommodation available in hotels, farm holiday, farmhouse, residence self-catering accommodation, b&b, rooms for rent, holiday homes, camp sites and tourist villages.
Restaurants Typical Products Services Leisure Time
Calabria
