Among dishes and bottles
Food and wine here in the Marches can be a real discovery!
People are closely linked with their farming traditions and deeply fond of their roots with nature, agriculture and genuine nutrition. The Mediterranean diet is closely linked in such kind of society.
No rush, even the take away “crescia” must be tasted in a nearly solemn way: piace? is it good?
That makes your day.
“Nonna” is still in the kitchen, at least on Sundays; “Mamma” generally is working and buys sometimes quickly in the “Rosticceria”, something already cooked to bring home. Nowadays also the Italians often skip lunch, have just a snack. In the Restaurants nobody pretends that you order a full Italian meal; a “primo” (noodles or risotto) is fine, alternatively a big mixed salad (una insalatona), a “tagliere”, a plate of ham or cheese selections accompanied by a good glass of vine.
But if you sit down, you’ll take your time, slow food eating is a must! It still is and will always be part of the Italian culture.
Our home-made pasta is still the run, the classical “primo” (the first dish, obviously followed by a “secondo” and dolce – dessert). Among the local specialties are “strozzapreti”, always so good that you can’t stop eating them, so good that they even “strangle the priests”.
On the coast taste the fresh fish, the “pesce azzurro” of the Adriatic Sea, small seized but very tasty! You can have it together with noodles, as a sauce, or as polenta with clams (yellow corn-meal, boiled into a thick consistency), “brodetto” (stewed fish in a dense sauce), char-grilled sardines with bread and salad.
In our inland, on the Apennine hills you can get an excellent mix of meat; quails, pigeon, chicken, rabbit and grilled meat are a classic, including the Marchigiana breed of cattle.
Meat and seafood may be cooked in similar ways. For example poultry, fish, even dried cod are often done in “potacchio”, with onion, tomato, white wine and rosemary, while duck, rabbit, ham, even sea snails could be done in “porchetta”, with wild fennel, garlic and rosemary.
Cheese often figures also in desserts which are usually moderately sweet. Think of the famous “tirami sù” made of mascarpone, Ascoli’s Calcioni, ravioli like pastries made with fresh pecorino; Macerata’s “picioni” with ricotta, rum and cinnamon.
Many of the food products have been granted DOC (Denomination of controlled origin) and DOCG (Denomination of controlled and guaranteed origin) status. The Region’s 11 DOC wines are led by “Verdicchio”, but also the “Bianchello del Metauro” is a white that perfectly accompanies fish, poultry, veal and rabbit. Ancona’s unsung pride is “Rosso Conero”, a full bodied red from the Montepulciano grape. “Rosso Piceno” from the southern vineyards can also show class.
Finally, the cherry liqueur “Visciolata” will end the meal in local style.
Our PRODUCTS OF EXCELLENCE
are strongly linked to a particular part of our land.
Here just a few examples:
| Carpegna | and its notable raw ham, the “prosciutto” |
| Urbino | and a young and mild, sometimes even sweet Pecorino, called “Casciotta”. |
| Talamello | and a cheese made from a mix of sheep and cow’s milk into forms wrapped in cloth and buried in pits carved out of tufa where mold forms and accounts for special flavor |
| Acqualagna | and its truffles, the precious key ingredient in international cuisine |
| Cartoceto | and the olive trees of its surroundings, olives rigorously hand-picked and immediately pressed cold to extract the best fragrance |
| Ascoli Piceno | and its giant olives, stuffed with a meat-cheese-bread filling and deep fried |
| Castelluccio di Norcia | and its mountain slopes where exquisite small lentils are grown |
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