What to eat in Brindisi: a local's food guide

What is Brindisi known for, food-wise?

My grandmother did her shopping by ear. She walked towards the harbour in the morning and listened: if the fishermen were loud, it had been a good night, and lunch would be mussels. Brindisi still eats like that. It is a port in the flattest, most farmed part of Puglia, so the cooking sits between two worlds: the boats on one side, wheat, olives, vegetables and vines on the other.

The result is not refined restaurant food. It is cucina povera, peasant and fisherman cooking, made with few ingredients and a lot of olive oil. A plate of orecchiette with tomato and a spoon of hard ricotta, fava bean purée with bitter greens, a whole octopus stewed in its own water. You eat well here without trying hard, as long as you know what to look for.

This guide is that list. We do not name restaurants, because they change and we would rather tell you in person: ask us when you arrive and we will give you the current shortlist.

Brindisi dishes at a glance

Seafood from the harbour

Start with the antipasti di mare. In a good seafood place this is not one plate but a slow parade: marinated anchovies, octopus salad, baked mussels, small fried fish, perhaps a seafood soup. Often it is enough for a full meal, so order pasta only after you see how much arrives.

Polpo alla pignata is the octopus dish of the coast: cooked slowly in a clay pot (the pignata) with tomato, onion and a little wine, until it is soft enough to cut with a spoon. Cozze arracanate are mussels on the half shell, baked with breadcrumbs, garlic, parsley and pecorino. You will also see stuffed cuttlefish and squid, and grilled fish sold by weight: ask the price per kilo before you choose.

One thing you will not find, or should not: sea urchins. They used to be the symbol of a winter evening by the sea, but the regional government has banned their harvesting to let the population recover, and the ban has been extended to 2029. If someone offers them, it is better to say no.

Tiella: the dish that tastes of Brindisi

If you eat one dish that feels local, make it the tiella, or taiedda in dialect. Rice, sliced potatoes, onion, tomato and mussels opened raw and left in their half shell are layered in a wide pan, covered with water and grated pecorino, and baked. The mussels release their sea water into the rice as it cooks. Every family argues about the order of the layers, and some older Brindisi versions leave out the rice altogether. It is the kind of dish trattorias make at lunch and often run out of by 14:00, so do not leave it too late.

Pasta and the cucina povera

Orecchiette, small ear-shaped pasta made from durum wheat and water, are everywhere. With cime di rapa (turnip tops), garlic, chilli and a little anchovy they are the winter classic. In summer, look for them with fresh tomato sauce and grated cacioricotta, a salty aged ricotta. Around Brindisi they are also served with meat rolls, brasciole, cooked slowly in tomato sauce on Sundays.

Fave e cicoria, a purée of dried fava beans with boiled wild chicory and raw olive oil on top, is the dish that sums up peasant cooking in this part of Puglia. Ciceri e tria, pasta and chickpeas with part of the pasta fried until crisp, is the Salento version of comfort food. Both are cheap, filling and very good with a glass of red.

Street food and the bakery

Pittule (also called pettole) are soft balls of yeasted dough fried in oil, sometimes with an olive, a caper or a piece of anchovy hidden inside. They appear in the cold months and around Christmas, sold hot in paper cones.

The frisa is a ring of twice-baked bread. You dip it quickly in water, then cover it with chopped tomato, salt, oregano and plenty of olive oil. It is the summer lunch of the beach and the terrace. From nearby Lecce come the rustico, a disc of puff pastry filled with béchamel, mozzarella and tomato, and the puccia, a soft round bread stuffed like a sandwich. Add taralli, small crunchy rings flavoured with fennel or chilli, and you have the aperitivo sorted.

Sweets and coffee

Breakfast in Salento means a pasticciotto, shortcrust pastry filled with custard, eaten warm if you are lucky. It comes from Lecce and every bar in Brindisi has it. The sporcamuss, puff pastry with custard dusted in icing sugar, is found across Puglia (Bari claims it too); the name means something like "dirty face", which is what happens when you eat it.

At Christmas look for mustazzoli, spiced biscuits with almonds and cocoa covered in a dark glaze. In summer the drink is caffè in ghiaccio: an espresso poured over ice, often with a splash of almond milk, as they make it in Lecce. Order one at 16:00 and you understand siesta culture immediately.

Which wine to drink in Brindisi

The plain around Brindisi is red wine country, flat, hot and windy. Negroamaro is the main grape: dark, a little bitter at the finish, good with tomato sauces and grilled meat. It is also the base of the area's excellent rosés, which are what most locals drink with fish in summer.

Look out for Susumaniello, an old local grape that almost disappeared and is now back, as a red and in rosés. The Brindisi DOC appellation covers reds and rosés made mostly from Negroamaro, sometimes with Susumaniello. Nearby you find Salice Salentino and, towards Taranto, Primitivo di Manduria. A good bottle in a wine shop is not expensive, and it tastes better on a terrace than in any bar.

A day of eating in Brindisi, and cooking it yourself

• Breakfast: pasticciotto and caffè in ghiaccio at the counter, standing, as locals do.
• Lunch: a frisa at the beach, or a tiella in a trattoria before 14:00.
• Aperitivo: a glass of Negroamaro rosé with taralli and olives as the harbour lights come on.
• Dinner: antipasti di mare, then grilled fish or octopus. Italians eat late here, from about 20:30 in summer.
• After: a gelato on the waterfront and a slow walk back through the old town.

If you stay in an apartment, the markets are half the fun. Buy tomatoes, burrata from the Bari area, fresh orecchiette, olives and whatever fish looks bright-eyed that morning. BDS House has a full kitchen and a terrace table for six, and a long dinner on the rooftop is the best restaurant in town on a warm night. You can see availability here.

For more of what to do between meals, see things to do in Brindisi, and if you are only here for a night or two, our Brindisi stopover guide fits the essential dishes into one evening.