Whilst polished concrete, artfully distressed interiors and industrial chic are all the rage in London and New York, there is only really one de rigueur fixture that I’ve noticed in many of the best eateries in Southern Italy; white plastic garden chairs and tables. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that there appears to be a direct correlation between the restaurants that have these in their dining area and the tastiness of their food.
Pizzeria dei Platani, Laureto
In mid-September I was staying at the Masseria Fragnale in the hamlet of Laureto, just outside Fasano. The masseria is over 100 years old, was extensively renovated and extended in 2006, and is now run by a local family who have filled the place with tasteful antique furniture, including unusual four-poster beds, carved in India.
It was a few days of rest and relaxation ahead of the start of the school term; daily morning swims in the outdoor pool, taking my time absorbing Big Joanie frontwoman Stephanie Phillips’ book Why Solange Matters and then spending the afternoon driving through the more remote parts of the Pugliese countryside, stopping off at whichever cove happened to look particularly alluring.
After spending my first night exploring the delights of Fasano (the nearest reasonably-sized town to Masseria Fragnale), on the second evening I chose to stay local and see what Laureto had to offer. There was a rough and ready-looking braceria (barbeque joint) that I decided to swerve, before taking a punt on the unassuming Pizzeria dei Platani.
Pizzeria dei Platani’s non-nonsense dining area and a typical evening there.
You had to place your order through a service hatch leading directly into the kitchen and the menu immediately piqued my interest. Alongside the usual Margherita, Diavola, Capricciosa offerings was the ‘Leeds United’. For context; Laureto is 60 km south of Bari, 500 km from Rome and over 2,000 km from Leeds, West Yorkshire. I asked the chap serving me about the origins of this strangely-named pizza and he explained that his father spent some time living and working in Leeds (I’m guessing perhaps during Don Revie’s ‘Golden Years’) and that this pizza had been created to honour him. For some reason, I was wearing my Taranto FC 1927 / Birra Raffo shirt (a risky move in Barese / Leccese territory) and this led to us having a decent chat about football. Strangely, it turned out that FC Taranto’s current manager Davide Pedone is actually from Laureto.
I paid the princely sum of €6 for the pizza and a cold Peroni and when it arrived it did not disappoint. The pizza came topped with burrata, crushed pistachios and red onions and was incredibly moist and succulent. The guy who served me even came over to make sure it was ok; this was a place that clearly took pride in their food. Not the healthiest of dinner choices but then again, the kilometre I was swimming every morning in the masseria’s piscina probably just about worked off the calories.
Masseria Fragnale. Laureto, Puglia.
Pizzeria dei Platani’s dining area was covered but with open sides and the ubiquitous TVs dotted around showing the Netherlands vs Turkey World Cup Qualifier game (even the higher end restaurants in Italy have TVs mounted on the walls). There was a large Italian family next to me with everyone from grandma right through the toddlers sat together enjoying their pizza. The seats? You’ve guessed it, white plastic chairs and tables throughout the restaurant.
The menu at Pizzeria dei Platani (clearly this photo was taken before the addition of the ‘Leeds United’ pizza).
When your pizza was ready, it was placed on a plastic tray on top of a piece of paper and then you collected it from the service hatch yourself. Disposable napkins were retrieved from a dispenser in the middle of your table. Once you were finished, you simply threw the paper into the recycling bin and placed the tray on the pile to be cleaned. A highly efficient, no-fuss system that reminded me of another legendary and wallet-friendly (£3.95 a pizza anyone?) pizzeria; Icco on Goodge Street in Fitzrovia, London. Icco was the site of many post-work pizzas back in the early 2010s.
Via Plebiscito (aka ‘Meat Street’), Catania
In September 2020, I spent 10 days on an impromptu roadtrip travelling around Sicily. My final stop was Catania, Sicily’s second biggest city that sits in the ominous shadow of Mount Etna, Europe’s largest active volcano. Most of the city’s buildings are characteristically dark as they have been built with volcanic rock. I very nearly moved to Catania instead of Bari earlier that year and thoroughly enjoyed my time in the city, finding it a little less hectic and more manageable than Palermo, its counterpart on the other side of the island.
One afternoon, I decided to get out of the city centre and find a braceria that specialised in hearty, no-frills, Sicilian street food such as grilled meat and bacon (or intestines if you prefer) wrapped around spring onions, cooked over charcoal. I was recommended a number of places on Via Plebiscito, a thoroughfare leading away from the city centre to the north-west. The street was a little rough around the edges but lined with a number of cafes, restaurants and street food stalls, all specialising in barbequed meat. Macelleria d’Antone, Dal Tenerissimo, Trattoria Achille, Trattoria Il Principe – take your pick. The locals apparently describe the area as “arrusti e mangia“ – “roast and eat”. They’re not wrong.
The various meaty delights of Via Plebiscito, Catania.
I had lunch at Dal Tenerissimo and then returned on another evening to check out what Macelleria d’Antone had to offer in the way of street food. Via Plebiscito was pretty relaxed around lunchtime and I had a piece of breaded pork, served in a bun and curiously, a mousse of soft cheese and crushed pistachios. However, at night the street was an entirely different proposition. It was dimly-lit, heaving with local Catanians and the smoke from the various barbeques and grills placed on the street gave it an almost-medieval air. The smell of meat being cooked was pungent and the neon red sign of Trattoria Achille made it look like a place that would be at home on Hamburg’s Reeperbahn. The atmosphere was ever so slightly anarchic and felt very authentically Sicilian.
At Macelleria d’Antone, the service was brusque but efficient and I sampled a paper plate of the bacon wrapped around spring onions, a coarse sausage and a cutlet of what I imagine was horse meat (it’s very popular in Sicily). It’s not something I would want to eat every day but the bacon and spring onions in particular, were great. Both restaurants had white plastic chairs and tables throughout; as we now know, a firm barometer of quality in Southern Italy…
Bacon (or intestines) wrapped around whole spring onions. An acquired taste but actually a delicious snack alongside an ice-cold beer.
There are a number of other restaurants in the region that fit into this category; several of the more casual pizzerias and rosticcerias in Bari, Ricciolandia near Torre Canne (where the late Anthony Bourdain stopped for lunch in his series Parts Unknown) and most of the eateries in the bustling La Vucciria market in Palermo. Dining in Italy can be a very regimented, formal affair if you want it to be and for many Italians eating is sacred. Don’t even attempt to suggest having lunch at midday or dinner at 7pm, and alter an ingredient in a traditional recipe at your peril. However, on other occasions, keeping it simple is king and what the plastic chairs and tables represent is that sometimes people just want to go somewhere they feel comfortable and relaxed, and to eat some honest comfort food.
Where possible, I’ve included hyperlinks to all of the eateries I’ve talked about in the article above.
Anthony Bourdain dining at Ricciolandia, Torre Cane (Parts Unknown, Season 10, Episode 9) and the lively La Vucciria night market, Palermo.