Basilicata
Basilicata is the arch of Italy's boot: a small, mountainous, thinly populated region between Puglia and Calabria. Its cooking is dry-larder food: durum bread, dried sweet peppers fried until they shatter, pulses, aged sheep's cheeses and mutton stewed for hours in a clay pot.
Basilicata has only two short stretches of coast: thirty kilometres on the Tyrrhenian around Maratea and a flat beach on the Ionian at Metaponto. Everything else is mountain and clay hill. The Pollino massif closes the south, the Lucanian Apennines run through the middle, and in the north sits Vulture, an extinct volcano with black soils and two crater lakes. That landlocked geography produced a cuisine of the storeroom, built on what keeps: durum wheat, dried pulses, dried peppers, sheep and goat meat, long-aged cheese.
The defining ingredient is the peperone di Senise IGP. Picked in late summer, threaded on string into garlands called serte, hung on balconies to dry and then dropped into hot oil for three seconds, it becomes crusco (crisp, sweet, not hot at all) and is crumbled over salt cod, over pasta with fried breadcrumbs, over beans. Around it are the beans of Sarconi, the red aubergine of Rotonda that looks like a tomato and tastes faintly of artichoke, the aged canestrato of Moliterno and caciocavallo podolico, made from the milk of Podolica cattle that graze half-wild on the high pastures.
Matera and Potenza are two different regions in practice. Matera faces the Murgia plateau and Puglia: sourdough durum bread baked in two-kilo loaves in wood ovens and still good a week later, cardoncelli mushrooms, and crapiata, a soup of seven pulses and grains cooked in the courtyards every 1 August. Potenza and the inland valleys are colder and more carnivorous: mutton stewed in a terracotta pignata, lucanica sausage, and rafanata, a frittata of wild horseradish with a wasabi-like kick.
The serious wine comes from Vulture, planted between 450 and 700 metres on volcanic soil. Aglianico del Vulture is among the last grapes harvested anywhere in Italy, often well into November, and makes a tight, tannic red that ages for decades. The villages below (Barile, Rionero, Ripacandida) keep cellars cut into the soft tufa rock, naturally cool all year.
Signature dishes
- Peperoni cruschi (flash-fried dried sweet peppers)
- Baccalà con i cruschi (salt cod with crisp peppers)
- Crapiata (seven-pulse summer soup)
- Cialledda (stale-bread and tomato salad)
- Pignata di pecora (mutton stewed in a clay pot)
- Lagane e ceci (wide pasta ribbons with chickpeas)
- Rafanata (wild horseradish frittata)
- Strascinati con mollica (pasta with fried breadcrumbs)
Foods from here
When to go
On 1 August, Matera cooks crapiata in its courtyards; August is also when Sarconi celebrates its beans and Senise its peppers, and when the red garlands appear on every façade. On 2 July, Matera parades a papier-mâché cart for the Madonna della Bruna and then lets the crowd tear it apart. September and October are pepper-drying months. The Aglianico harvest comes last of all, from late October into November, when the rest of Italy has finished. Winter is the season for aged sheep's cheeses, podolico caciocavallo and slow-stewed meat, and for a Matera with almost no visitors in it.
Frequently asked
What is Basilicata known for?
Basilicata, also called Lucania, is the arch of Italy's boot, between Puglia and Calabria. In food terms it is known for peperoni cruschi (dried sweet peppers flash-fried until they shatter), the sourdough durum bread of Matera, and Aglianico del Vulture, a tannic red grown on an extinct volcano.
What should I eat in Matera?
Start with the bread: Pane di Matera is baked in wood ovens in loaves of a kilo or more and stays good for a week. Then cialledda, a salad of soaked stale bread with tomato and onion, cardoncelli mushrooms, and crapiata, the pulse-and-grain soup cooked in the courtyards every 1 August.
Are peperoni cruschi hot?
No. The Senise pepper is a sweet variety with thin walls, grown for drying rather than for heat. The pods are threaded into garlands, hung on balconies through the autumn, then dropped into hot oil for about three seconds until they turn crisp. They are crumbled over salt cod, pasta and beans.
When is the best time to visit Basilicata for food?
September and October, when the peppers are drying on every façade and the Aglianico harvest runs late, often into November. August is festival month: crapiata in Matera on the 1st, beans at Sarconi, peppers at Senise. Winter is quiet, and good for aged cheeses, clay-pot mutton and an empty Matera.
What food should I bring home from Basilicata?
A garland of dried Senise peppers, which keeps for months hung somewhere dry, and a wedge of Moliterno or Filiano sheep's cheese. Dried Sarconi beans travel well too. Fry the peppers yourself: three seconds in hot oil, then straight onto kitchen paper, or they scorch and turn bitter.