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Planning a trip to Puglia, Italy and wondering what to eat and drink? This is your go-to guide for discovering the best traditional foods and drinks in Bari and across the beautiful Puglia region in southern Italy.
From orecchiette pasta with broccoli rabe to fresh seafood, focaccia barese, and rich local wines, Puglia is a food lover’s dream! In this video, we explore the top dishes, snacks, and drinks that you must try—along with where to find them and how to enjoy them like a local.
We also cover regional wines, digestivi, and traditional drinks unique to southern Italy.
Cities & Regions Featured:
Bari
Polignano a Mare
Alberobello
Lecce
Ostuni
#PugliaFood #WhatToEatInPuglia #BariItaly #ItalyTravelGuide #SouthernItalyEats #WoltersWorldEatsWolters
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Hey the fellow travelers, Mark here with Walter's World and today we're here in Bari in Puglia and
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today I want to talk about what you can eat and drink when you come here to the Puglia region and
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Bari specifically because there's a lot of really great food from here because if you talk to anybody
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around Italy and you said you're going down to Bari and you're going to Puglia they all say that
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you're going to eat really really well and you will when you're here and so what I want to do is
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kind of start with some of the snacks you're going to have when you're here and probably the most popular one that that i've eaten and i've enjoyed in my lifetime here in italy is penzorotti or a
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penzorotto if you just want one but usually you want two but penzorotti is basically a fried
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calzone so it's the kind of like the the pizza dough fried but inside there'll be different stuff
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the most popular one is mozzarella and tomato inside it is so good like you have to get it when
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you're here i know i whenever i'm in milan i go grab one because there's a special place up there
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you can get it, but it's actually from here in Puglia. And so that's one thing you want to have. It makes a really good snack if you're walking around or if you're going to be just exploring
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and you don't want to sit down for a long meal. It's really, really good. Okay. Now, another thing
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you're going to see here is Spagliozza. I know I'm butchering some of the names, but basically what
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it is, it's a fried piece of polenta, like a rectangle. It looks like almost like a, I don't
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know, a French toast stick almost, but it's made out of polenta, which is made out of cornmeal
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That's a really popular thing here. Just sprinkle a little salt on and eat away. That's quite popular
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But probably the most famous and most eaten snack from Puglia when you're here is something you have with your aperitivi, your drinks all throughout Italy
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And that's taralli. And taralli are just these circles, crispy, savory circles in multiple flavors
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And I've said this in a lot of videos, but Liam likes to call them the goldfish of Italy because they're everywhere
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They're in all kinds of flavors, and everyone likes to have them while they're having a drink, okay
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So that's one thing you're going to definitely have at some of the bars and some of the places when you sit down, they give you a snack
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That's definitely going to be something you're going to see. Now, another really popular kind of walk-it-around snack or something you just want to grab and definitely have when you're here is the focaccia
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And if you're not sure what focaccia is, it's the like really fluffy bread with stuff kind of stuffed in the top
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It's not pizza. It's focaccia. And here they have focaccia barrese, which is focaccia with tomatoes and olives in it
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And that is something you really want to have when you're here. and you can get it as like a bigger snack or a smaller snack or when you go into the bakeries
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they have it and when you walk around here if you do any of the tours of the city i pretty much guarantee i can guarantee but i pretty much guarantee they will stop at one of the the bakeries here and they will get you a focaccia barese with the tomatoes and onion or with the tomatoes and olives
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on it like it's like a must when you are here now another great snack is when you're walking around
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you'll see lots of different sandwiches that are here and they're all gonna be good but probably one i'd recommend especially in pignone amare is the panino col pulpi which is a grilled octopus
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sandwich. Yes, it looks like it's something out of a cartoon, but it's amazing. Like you have to
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have one of those if you are in Polina Amare or some other places that have it because oh my god
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they're so good. Okay. Now there's also a puccia salentina, which is basically another kind of
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sandwich. Basically you get this soft roll. You'll see these bread rolls that are here and it just
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has ham and some salad on there and some cheese. Just a quick little bite to eat when you go. And so
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that's one of the things is there's a lot of really good street food and like walking around
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food and affordable food here when you're in Bari and Puglia because this is historically not one of
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the more wealthy regions of Italy so a lot of the food is made in a way that is actually affordable
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for everyone to enjoy. But if you are going to sit down at a restaurant some of the some of the
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pastas you're going to have around here in Puglia probably the most popular here in Bari
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is orechietti which means little ears there's places you can go and watch these old ladies make
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them you can buy them at the store but you'll see it at the restaurants and there's a lot of different versions you can get. You can get it with broccoli rabe if you want on there. You can
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get it with turnip greens. You can have that. I actually had it with horse the other day and just
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a ragu, a tomato ragu. And it was just, it's really, really good. It's really like dense pasta
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but fun to eat. Liam had it about six times here, Bolognese style. So you'll have different
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you know, sauces to go with it. But orechietti is definitely one you want to have. Now
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another pasta you're going to see is cavatelli, which looks like, how would I explain this? Like
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a parchment rolled together but really small one like rolled up so like the two like circle parts
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of there you'll see that if you're down by leche you'll probably see tria which when you look at
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it it's a pasta of course but when you look at it looks more like it's going to be like a noodle for an old-fashioned kind of like soup or a chicken noodle soup kind of thing but you might
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have that and you can get the trio with chickpeas which is very popular lechee so like another dish
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you could look at when you are traveling around pulia and the thing is there's lots of different
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sauces you can have you can have lots of fish and shellfish with your pasta too so there's
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There's plenty of options to go along with the different pastas that are here. If you looking for some more fortifying kind of stuff there actually something called riso patata y cose which is rice potatoes and mussels and it comes like in this terracotta bowl It actually pretty good If it
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a little dry, put a little oil on there, you'll be fine, but that's actually a very traditional thing from here. I had it the other day, it was quite good. Now, if you're looking for something that's
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a bomb, you can get a bombeca, which is basically a pork roll with cheese, you can have that
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but the thing is, is when you go around, you'll see a lot of lamb, you'll see a lot of actually
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horse on the menu here because again going back Puglia does not have a history of having a lot of
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money and so therefore meat wasn't always a big thing on the menu all the time so you will see
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more interesting cuts of meat and styles of meat when you're here but of course if you want to get
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like a steak or something like that you'll be able to find it it's not all horse and goat so don't
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worry or lamb I should say but just know that that's there and and the thing is but you're here
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on the sea and what you have to realize is Puglia is basically the heel of the boot of Italy so it
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just goes down it's like 900 kilometers it seems like of coastline it just goes on forever so
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there's tons of seafood you can have when you're here you can get swordfish which is pesca spada
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you can get that you can get sea bass which is brunzino you can get orata which is sea bream
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the frutti di mare all the different shellfishes that are here octopus is really good fried calamari
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you can get a frutti misti which is basically a bunch of different shellfish and little fish that's
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all fried up might come in a little cone for you i mean there's a lot of really good things to eat
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from the sea when you're here. Now another thing we have to talk about when we're in here in Puglia is the cheese
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because there's a lot of different cheeses when you're here. Probably the most famous, the one you might see at your own grocery store back home
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is parata. If you're not sure what parata is, if you ever watch a video on Instagram about cheese
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and they have a big thing that looks like a mozzarella ball and then they cut it and it like leaks out
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that's parata. It is a super soft cheese that has like the mozzarella looking outside
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and then you cut it and it's just this super soft cheese inside
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It's so just amazing. This is the place you want to have it. You know, you have with some tomatoes and stuff
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It is so good. It's so good. You have to have that. Now, gravina is actually a popular place for cheese as well
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There's two kinds I'd want to tell you about. One is falone, which is a sheep's goat milk kind of fresh cheese you're going to have
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So you have to eat that the day you get it. Another one is palone, the gravina, which is a semi-hard cheese
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And it looks like a ball, hence why it's spelled palone, so you can get that. And then you've got canistrato, which is a hard cheese you can get
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You might see that getting graded on some of your pasta when you're here. So there's a lot of really great cheeses that are here
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I mean I could do a whole video just on the cheeses of this region just like every region in Italy but definitely definitely don pass up a cheese plate when you are here if you looking for a snack and then if we look at the drinks that are here wine is a very big thing like really bold red wines from puglia are quite
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famous um one of the wines is from here that you've probably heard of is primitivo and primitivo comes
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a lot of different versions let's say but it is definitely got definitely packs a punch when you're
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here so that's something you can try and the thing is you can do wine tastings when you're here you
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You can do cheese tastings when you're here. You can do cooking classes when you're here, learn how to make all the stuff here, which is really nice
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I mean, honestly, when I was looking up things to do in Bari, it was like eight of the top ten things were cooking classes
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because food is such a big thing here. Now, if you're looking for something for dessert, there's a few desserts that are here
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Probably the most famous one, the one you're going to see in the pictures and the menus and all kinds of stuff
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is pastis ciotti, which is basically, how do I explain it? It's a custard tart, basically
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And inside, they'll have the custard. There may be some sour cherry or something else in there, but that's a really popular thing
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There's petole, which are basically like fried donut balls, which you don't see as often as the other stuff
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But that is an option that's here. Also, there's porcamus, which looks like just like filo dough
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And it's just, oh, it's messy. Let's just put it that way. You're going to get it. You're going to get stuff on yourself
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But it's really, really good. And the thing is, when you come here to Puglia and you come to Bari, there's so many great restaurants, so many places to go eat
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you will not have a problem going out and having fun and meeting people because the people here in Pudli are really friendly and really outgoing
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and they want to meet people. So when you're going out to eat, when you're going out to have your aperitivos, your drinks
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definitely take that chance to say hi to the locals and maybe get to know them because they are super gregarious and super fun to hang out with
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So I just want to give you that kind of tip when you do come here
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Oh, also, remember, since it's really hot here, they like to eat later. So some restaurants don't open until 8 o'clock at night
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So just be aware of that. But they eat late into the evening. So you can have a really great time and really enjoy the food when you're here
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And they're not going to pressure you to hurry up to get out of places. So I hope this helps you know what to eat when you come here to Bari or Puglia in general
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If you want to learn more, maybe the don'ts of visiting Bari, so the day trips from here
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check us out on our website at waltersworld.com. We're also on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, TikTok, all those places
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And we really appreciate your likes, subscriptions. And if you like honest travel videos like this, you can go to our Walters World Travel channel
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We put out new videos every Wednesday and Saturday. Or you can stay here on Walter's World Eats and learn about more food around the world
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Ciao from here in Bari, Italy
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