Today, are talking about Abruzzo: four provinces, an Adriatic coast, three Apennine massifs, three national parks, and various protected natural areas. A mountainous and wooded region with a rich flora and fauna heritage, beautiful, wild, and yet very hospitable.

The recipes of these lands have been jealously preserved over the centuries by the women, who prided themselves on the culinary delicacies based on citrus fruits, saffron, herbs, and sauces prepared through a skillful mix of ingredients. Recipes that were handed down from generation to generation from mother to daughter.

Sometimes you’ll find simple dishes in Abruzzo, such as lamb chops, other times more complex, such as macaroni alla pastora, but always excellent to taste. Desserts, ranging from caggionetti to Carnival cicerchiata, and let’s not forget the very simple but tasty and delicious arrosticini!

1- Pizz’onde

Fried pizza is not only a Neapolitan specialty. Pizz’onde or pizzonte are a typical Abruzzo street food, whose literal meaning is precisely that of “greasy pizza“. The standard flour, water, yeast, and salt dough is divided into many small disks and dipped in boiling oil. Sometimes milk is added to make these appetizing pizzas even softer and more fragrant.

The rest is then taken care of by the toppings which, just like the standard pizza, range from vegetables to cheese and meat. First, however, we advise you to try them plain. You will find that they are also very good on their own, golden, crunchy and above all very oily.

2- Pipindune e ove

Who doesn’t like a little color on their plate? From Collecorvino, where a dedicated festival is held every year, comes the traditional and colorful pipindune e ove.

A single summer dish consists of fried peppers and beaten eggs. Not exactly light but delicious, this dish was the typical peasant breakfast, the one made in the middle of the morning to take a break from work in the fields. Today it is made for picnics and trips out of town, especially if used as a filling for sandwiches.

3- Pizz e fuje

Do you ever feel like trying a vegan dish in Abruzzo? Maybe, just maybe, the pizz e fuje (or foje depending on the cadence) is getting. The name in this case is slightly misleading, since it is a kind of cornmeal polenta, that is cooked in the oven or in a pan, which forms the shape of the dish.

Above we find the “fuje”, or the leaves of boiled green vegetables such as chicory, turnip tops, chard, and borage. Finally, crumbled dried pepper and, if you like, anchovies or salted sardines to taste.

The dish is typically prepared in winter but, due to its lightness, it is easily appreciated all year round. Whether you are vegan or not, this is a tasty and delicious dish to try.

4- Scrippelle ‘mbusse

Scrippelle are a strictly savory first course, whose dough, based on water, flour, and eggs, is rolled up, sprinkled with pepper and pecorino, and dipped in chicken broth.

The scrippelle also replaces the pastry in the famous teramana timbale, a single dish also brought to the fore overseas with the 1996 film Big Night.

In the local recipe, the scrippelle constitute the layers, sandwiched by small balls, sauce, and cheese – with all the variations, inspiration, and availability of ingredients.

5- Mazzarelle

Mazzarelle, not mozzarelle as in the cheese, are a first course of meat.

These are rolls of lamb offal wrapped in lettuce or endive leaves and tied with the intestines which can be simply fried or stewed. The prelude to the triumph of mutton and lamb that will soon follow, both here and on Easter tables.