{"id":5202,"date":"2022-11-23T06:39:23","date_gmt":"2022-11-23T11:39:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/?p=5202"},"modified":"2022-11-23T06:42:24","modified_gmt":"2022-11-23T11:42:24","slug":"the-italian-region-where-tomato-is-off-the-menu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/2022\/11\/23\/the-italian-region-where-tomato-is-off-the-menu\/","title":{"rendered":"The Italian region where tomato is off the menu"},"content":{"rendered":"

(CNN) \u2014\u00a0Ah Italy, the land of pizza, pasta and plenty of tomato sauce. At least, that’s the impression many visitors have when planning a trip to the Bel Paese. But if they’re planning to visit popular tourist sites like Cinque Terre or Portofino, they might be in for a shock — because the traditional food of Liguria, the northwest coastal region where both are located, is far from what outsiders might call “Italian.”<\/p>

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That’s nuts:\u00a0<\/strong>Liguria’s famous raw nut pesto dates back to medieval times and has an Arab influence.<\/sub><\/figcaption><\/figure>

Where other regions of Italy have traditional dishes that are what we’d recognize as “Italian” food, traditional Ligurian dishes are slightly different.<\/p>

Of course, there’s pasta with pesto. But there are also dishes like\u00a0farinata<\/em>, a kind of chickpea pancake that’s salted and served in slices, and\u00a0cappon magro<\/em>, a “salad” of seafood and cooked vegetables, slathered in basil-heavy green sauce, usually served in an elaborate pile that makes it look like a dish set for a banquet.<\/p>

As for tomatoes? You find them pepping up the odd stew or sauce but they’re not front and center as they are in our imaginings of “Italian” food.<\/p>

That’s partly down to the fact that Italy’s food scene is highly regional, with huge variation even from town to town. But, say experts, that’s not the only explanation.<\/p>

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Typical foods like focaccia were introduced before tomatoes arrived in Italy.
Magdalena Bujak\/Adobe Stock<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>
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Food streets:<\/strong>\u00a0Genoa’s\u00a0friggitorie<\/em>, or frying shops, have been deep-frying street food since medieval times.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>
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Thin strip:\u00a0<\/strong>The region of Liguria is jammed between the sea (like Boccadasse on the outskirts of Genoa) and mountains.<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Read more here<\/a><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(CNN) \u2014\u00a0Ah Italy, the land of pizza, pasta and plenty of tomato sauce. At least, that’s the impression many visitors have when planning a trip to the Bel Paese. But…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5203,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[960,961,963,962],"class_list":{"0":"post-5202","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-italian-region","9":"tag-liguria","10":"tag-no-tomatoes","11":"tag-pesto"},"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/http___cdn.cnn_.com_cnnnext_dam_assets_221025114731-05-liguria-food-pesto.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5202"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5202\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5207,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5202\/revisions\/5207"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/panoramitalia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}