Local specialties can be found in abundance in Bergamo. Their origins go back a long way, and they feature ingredients from the plains and the valleys around the city.
The typical starters are the salamis made by hand locally. The most famous is undoubtedly salame della bergamasca, which is quite soft and flavored with wine, but of course we mustn’t forget other specialties such as cacciatore, a small type of salami aged for just a few weeks, as well as other pork products such as cotechino (stuffed pigs’ trotters), lard, sausage and pancetta, a kind of streaky bacon.
The best-known local first course is casoncelli, a pasta shaped like a candy wrapper, stuffed with meat, cheese and vegetables, served with melted butter, grated grana padano cheese, pancetta and sage. On local menus, you’ll also be likely to find scarpinocc, another type of ravioli made with fresh pasta, whose name derives from the resemblance to the shoes (scarpe in Italian) that used to be worn in Parre, the village in Val Seriana the dish originates from. In this case, the filling does not contain meat, but breadcrumbs, cheese and a variety of spices.
Bergamo cuisine also means polenta e osei, polenta with little birds.
The most traditional of local dishes is indeed polenta served with little birds cooked in wine with pancetta. Delicious as they may be, however, the little birds have taken flight from restaurant menus, as they can no longer be served, so diners now have to make do with an equally tasty alternative: oselì scapac. These “birds that got away” are actually veal rolls, cooked with the local pancetta, sage, spices and wine.
Other dishes worth trying are brasato della bassa, leg of veal braised in red wine; coniglio alla bergamasca, a rabbit casserole with lard and juniper, and hare stew. Also very common are grilled sausages called strinù.
A word or two on polenta, which I mentioned earlier. This typical regional dish is made with cornmeal, boiled slowly with water and prepared in dozens of different ways. It is served as an accompaniment to main courses, or with a meat or sausage ragout, or with mushroom sauce. I suggest trying the famous polenta taragna, in which the cornmeal is cooked along with melted cheese. In Bergamo, the cheeses used are branzi or formai de mut, a mountain cheese made in the valleys around the city.
An interesting fact: if you’re a fan of ice cream, you might like to know that the famous stracciatella flavor was invented here in Bergamo, in 1961, in an ice cream parlor in Largo Colle Aperto, in the Upper Town.
What else can I say but… buon appetito!
