Italy Puglia cooking vacations and wine tours

We have been receiving lots of requests from our guests attending our cooking classes, culinary and wine tours in Puglia, about best places to visit while on vacation in Puglia and best things to do in each town.

We are happy to share an itinerary that could be helpful to travellers coming for a one week / 10-day vacation in Puglia.

First of all, please note that we think the most important reason why you should come to Puglia is its food, olive oil and wines. For sure you will love Puglia, if you love simple, fresh and delicious Italian food and wines. In addition to that, the beauty of Puglia is the fact that in one place you also find beautiful sandy beaches, cleanest sea water, relaxing countryside with millenary olive trees and vineyards, old historic towns with many influences from the Greek, Roman, to the Turkish and Spanish.

We chose our TOP 10 favorite places based on a combination of: local cuisine, wines, beauty of the place, location.

This itinerary may change according to the season you come.

Day 1: Our number one top location in Puglia is Lecce. We think you should make Lecce as your base for at least four days. Closest airport is Brindisi. Lecce has an elegant old town, with beautiful old palazzos and baroque churches. Please read our previous post about Best things to do in Lecce.

Because of the architecture, Lecce resembles Noto near Ragusa in Sicily. In Lecce, you should not miss all the gourmet shops, the market, the mozzarella makers and the very interesting papier machè artisans. The ice-cream in Lecce just off the main Saint’Oronzo square is the best you can get in Italy! We guarantee. You should count a whole day to visit Lecce.

Food in Lecce: restaurants in Lecce serve mainly freshly made pasta, vegetables, meat (little seafood as Lecce is not by the sea). Don’t miss the pasticciotto and rustico. Also the famous orecchiette with tomato sauce and cacioricotta cheese. 

Things to do near Lecce include: playing golf, scuba diving, sailing, shopping…enjoying the Dolce Vita!. Don’t forget about the siesta time in Lecce.

Day 2: Lecce is also a very good base if you want to visit and taste some of the best wines and extra virgin olive oils in Puglia. You should consider another whole day for the winery tours and olive oil tastings in the Salento area.

Lecce is an excellent base if you love white sandy beaches and seafood. From Lecce you can easily go to Gallipoli (our second Top favorite place in Puglia) and Otranto (our third Top favorite place in Puglia). If you do not want to run around Puglia, we recommend you just spend your holiday between Lecce, Otranto and Gallipoli. 

Day 3: In addition to its beautiful old town, Gallipoli has beautiful beaches and green water. If you love seafood, sea urchins, mussels, shirmps, octopus and any kind of fish, Gallipoli is definetely the place where to go.

The seafood market is small but you can find the freshest seafood sold by the fishermen.

If you arrive in Gallipoli early in the morning you can also see fishermen cleaning their fish nets.

Food in Gallipoli: includes freshly made pasta, vegetables, sea urchins and only seafood (it will be hard to find any meat). Don’t miss the red shrimps in sea salt crust. Also this is the place for sea urchins, which locals eat by the sea.

Gallipoli is the must see place if you love sunsets. Don’t miss an aperitif there. It’s one of the most romantic places if you come in a couple. You should consider spending at least one day in Gallipoli.

Things to do near Gallipoli include: swimming, watching the sunset, sailing and scuba diving…..relaxing on the beautiful beaches.

Day 4: Otranto (our fourth Top place) is another beautiful town, Unesco heritage, with a marvellous blue water. The white sandy beaches are also very nice but a little bit hidden. You need to know where to go. 

The old town is very special with the very interesting cathedral (don’t miss the mosaic) and the castle. What is really special about this area, is the coast going from Otranto all the way South. Driving along this coast will be an unforgettable experience.

Food in Otranto is mainly freshly made pasta, vegetables and seafood (no meat in Otranto). Don’t miss the sea bass in sea salt crust. You should consider spending at least one day in Otranto including the drive along its Southern coast.

Things to do near Otranto include: swimming, sailing, shopping.

Day 4/or 5: Our fourth top favorite place is Castro, another beautiful seaside town just south of Otranto and Lecce. There are no sandy beaches here, only rocks, but it is another beautiful and romantic place. If you are in hurry, you can visit Castro on the same day you visit Otranto, otherwise you should continue along the coast and visit the beautiful Santa Cesarea Terme, Novaglie (where there is out favorite restaurant in Puglia). Again food will be freshly made pasta, vegetables and seafood. Castro is considered a VIP place among locals.

Things to do near Castro include swimming, sailing and scuba diving…..admiring the beautiful sea view.

Day 6: Our fifth Top favorite place is Porto Selvaggio, another seaside place south of Gallipoli and Lecce. Porto Selvaggio is a WWF sea natural reserve. Before the sea water there is a wonderful forest easy to access.

The water has natural springs. We have lots of guests who say that hiking, riding a bike or just enjoying the water and sun in Porto Selvaggio was their best experience in Puglia. Because it is a natural reserve, you will have to bring your own food. Close by there is Nardò, where you can find fantastic bread and focaccia. You should consider spending at least one day in Porto Selvaggio.

Things to do in Porto Selvaggio include: hiking, biking, swimming.

Day 7 and 8: Moving up in the Northern part of Puglia, our sixth Top favorite places are Locorotondo and Cisternino. We suggest you use them as a base to visit the whole area (also known as Valle Itria).

You may spend two or three days in this area, where you find all the famous trulli houses. Locorotondo and Cisternino have beautiful old towns all whitewashed, with narrow streets and a very nice countryside.

They are certainly much more authentic and less touristy than Alberobello, where you find other trulli…..but be prepared for lots of tourists. Cisternino and Locorotondo are places to go to if you love meat (you don’t find Tuscan steaks though). 

Food in Cisternino and Locorotondo: don’t miss the famous bombette meat, the capocollo pancetta, the burrata cheese and the orecchiette with cime di rape (broccoli).

From Cisternino or Locorotondo you can easily visit in one day: Alberobello, Martina Franca, Polignano a Mare.

Day 9: From here you can visit our seventh Top favorite place in Puglia, Ostuni, also known as the white town, because of its whitewashed houses built on top of a hill. After you visit the very nice old town in Ostuni, you should go to have lunch or dinner in Ceglie Messapica, where you find very good restaurants and for sure less tourists.

Food in the Ostuni and Martina Franca area is based on freshly made pasta, vegetables, legumes, meat, cheese.

Things to do near Ostuni  and Fasano include: playing golf.

Depending on how much time you have left you should consider visiting either Matera or Trani (or both!).

Day 10: Matera is a very beautiful place. Even though it is in Basilicata it is very close to Puglia. Matera is famous for its stones and in fact it has often been used as a set for movies.

You should consider spending at least one day here and staying in a hotel or B&B in the caves. Especially at night it can be very romantic with all the lights from the caves.

Food in Matera and Altamura: in this area you should miss the freshly made pasta and also the famous bread, taralli and focaccia. Also this is the area of the excellent Aglianico wine.

Other less famous but still very beautiful places are Ginosa, Laterza and Mottola.

Day 10 or 11: Trani is our ninth Top favorite place. It is by the Adriatic sea and has a beautiful and elegant cathedral, all made with a white stone.

Food is based on lots of fresh pasta and all kinds of seafood. This area is famous for its fruity extra virgin olive oil from Andria and for the Nero di Troia wine. From Trani don’t miss Giovinazzo, less touristy but very nice. You should spend at least one day in Trani.

We left the Gargano area as our tenth Top favorite place. This is not because it is less beautiful than the other places we mentioned, but only because this area is so big and so far from the rest of the region, that if you decide to go there you should consider spending at least 5 or 6 days.

Closest airport is Bari. There are only small and slow roads in this area so don’t think of rushing to all places in one day. Our favorite places are: Peschici, Vieste, Mattinata. Here you find a combination of beautiful white sandy beaches, very nice sea nature and very good food, mainly from the sea.

We are so proud to announce that our Stile Mediterraneo blog has been chosen to receive a Tripbase 2011 Blog Award. This award has been given to the best 10 Italian cuisine blogs in 2011.

This year, all awards have been featured in CNBC, CBS and AOL News.

We thank all Tripbase readers for voting for us and look forward to providing lots of more interesting content about Puglia food and wine.

Watch a video of our past special tours at the villa castle. This is what to expect if you enter and win our contest! There are 20 days left. Don’t miss this opportunity.

I and Marika are just back from a wonderful 3-day cooking workshop held in Milan where all best Italian and International chefs got together to share the secrets behind their recipes and dishes.

Imagine yourself in the same room with Italian chefs from Massimiliano Alajmo, Carlo Cracco, Gennaro Esposito, Davide Oldani, Antonello Colonna, Niko Romito, Andrea Berton, to Elio Sironi, Davide Scabin, Ciccio Sultano and Massimo Bottura, who was recently awarded as the best chef in the world by the International Academy of Gastronomy in Paris.

The International chefs included: Inaki Aizpitarte, Paul Liebrandt, Sat Bains, Magnus Nilsson, Yoshihiro Narisawa.

During the three days, they prepared their famous dishes, telling about the ingredients they use, why they use them and how they put them together. In a few words they opened their kitchen doors to us.

Moreover, we got to taste most of the dishes they prepared, which means that we started eating at 10am until 7pm. We promise you that even if at some point we started getting full, these dishes were so fantastic that it was impossible to resist.

Our favorite workshops were the pasta sessions. Our number one favorite pasta dish was the pasta – pizza by Davide Scabin.

We also loved the idea of Carbonara pasta for breakfast by Elio Sironi (chef at the Bulgari hotel). He made it on top a nice bruschetta bread. Very nice way to start the day!

Of course we loved Gennaro Esposito and Carlo Cracco who are always so interesting. The biggest idea among many of them is that pasta can be cooked as if it was a risotto, without boiling the pasta in the water. Of course you can only do it with very high quality pasta. Cooking the pasta as a risotto helps preserving all the health benefits of pasta.

Finally we loved the spaghetti cacio e pepe by Antonello Colonna: so simple, but so wonderful!

The other super interesting cooking wokshop was the pizza session. We never had such a delicious pizza before. We got to learn (and taste!) the real pizza Napoletana from Napoli, the real Pizza Metro from Vico Equense and the fantastic pizza with natural yeast by Simone Padoan (and we could not believe he is from Verona!). Each pizza was made in three totally different ways.

As if all this was not enough, only the best food and wine producers were exhibiting their products: from best cheese, Parma ham, best pasta, to best wines and so much more.

A Grappa tasting was a good end to such good meals.

We think the best part was to see all these chefs (some of them so young!) supporting and praising each other without jealousy, rivalry or without comparing the different regional cuisines! They were all representatives of the Italian cuisine.

We are now back home ready to put together all the great learnings, videos and recipes….and to start eating again!

We already knew that New York is a place where a good idea can be taken so seriously that it becomes a huge trend. However, we never expected that after our last three weeks in the US, New York would become one of our favorite places in the world for espresso coffee. Being Italians and picky (when it comes to food, wine and coffee), this is a strong consideration!
It all started on our first day in NYC, about three weeks ago. I and Marika love the ACE Hotel (on W 29th St. and Broadway) and so we arranged all our meetings at its beautiful vintage lobby. When we first tasted the excellent espresso at the coffee bar just next door (Stumptown Coffee Roaster), we thought it was just a nice coincidence, or may be the jet lag.

When a few days later, we read Oliver Strand’s article on the New York Times, we understood it was not just a coincidence: something very serious was going on in New York.
On our spare time I and Marika went on a coffee tour trying as many coffee places recommended by Oliver Strand as we could. At the end of the tour, the Stumptown Coffee Roaster (by the Ace Hotel) was our first choice (first love!); but we also liked a lot the Third Rail Coffee, not too far from our favorite Soho area.

There are lots of things we liked about the coffee places we tried. First, noone of them belongs to a chain but they are all small and sort of boutique cafes (similar to what we have in Italy).
Moreover, as highlighted by Oliver Strand, lots of attention is dedicated to quality: from the origin, to roasting and grinding the beans, every little detail is taken into serious consideration (even more than in Italy!).

Finally, the espresso is always served in a ceramic coffee cup (real beautiful Italian style). This means that people must drink their espresso inside the coffee bar, when it’s still warm. As Oliver Strand points out, people cannot take it away and drink it cold. We also tried the “macchiato” which came with a little “heart” on top, made with the foam milk (again, like in Italy). We loved it!

The only coffee bar which we would add to Oliver Strand’s list would be Gina’s on Amsterdam Avenue (just next to our favorite Cesare Casella’s Salumeria Rosi). We particularly loved the “Italian way” of serving the coffee: the guy who made the coffee also came to talk to us. He started with a “buongiorno” and we ended up talking about his coffee for more than 10 minutes.
When we go to good restaurants we love having the chef/owner at our table explaining his or her dishes. When we have a good coffee we love talking to the person who made it for us. The coffee just tastes different and even “warmer”.

Finally the cherry on the cake of our trip to New York was having a tea (for a change!) with Fred Plotkin, which was a great honor for us since we love his book: Italy for the Gourmet Traveler. After the super fascinating conversation we had with him about the Italian cuisine, traditions, opera and culture (all in its perfect Italian!!!), he also told us how to taste a good coffee. And so we found out that Fred is a certified Maestro del Caffè (Coffee Master) with great knowledge and passion on topic.
What a wonderful trip! what interesting people! We love New York!

If you travel around Italy, you will certainly notice that food and recipes change completely from region to region and most of the times also from town to town. Even pasta, which is always thought of as the typical Italian food, is made with different ingredients depending on whether you are in the South or North of Italy.

Pizza is certainly one of the few national Italian dishes. Pizza was first made in Naples, but now you find it anywhere in Italy. The pizza dough is always made with the same ingredients: water, yeast, flour, salt, extra virgin olive oil.
What changes from region to region is the thickness of the dough or may be the topping variety.

We are putting together a list of some of the best pizza places in Italy. Please tell us where in Italy you had your best pizza!